The Berkeley Electronic Press has entered a three-year journal licensing agreement with the National Science and Technology Library (NSTL), a nationwide consortium of five hundred Chinese academic institutions, research institutes, and government departments. The agreement, brokered by The Charlesworth Group, includes twelve bepress journals in STM fields, among them Statistical Applications in Genetics and Molecular Biology, International Journal of Chemical Reactor Engineering, and International Journal of Nursing Education Scholarship. This contract represents bepress’ first major countrywide agreement in Asia.

We have also concluded a contract for ResearchNow Full Access with SURFdiensten, the licensing organization for academic libraries in The Netherlands. As a result, the bepress collection is available to UKB, one of the oldest consortia in the world. The members of UKB that have opted to participate as part of the initial agreement include Erasmus University of Rotterdam, University of Groningen, University of Tilburg, and Free University Amsterdam. For more about UKB, visit http://www.ukb.nl/english/index.html.

And, thanks to a recent agreement with the Consortium of Swiss Academic Libraries, ResearchNow Full Access is also now available to its members. A number of cantonal universities will license ResearchNow, including University of Fribourg, University of Lausanne, University of St. Gallen, and University of Geneva. For more about the consortium, visit http://lib.consortium.ch/index.php?lang=2.

Sean O’Doherty, vice president of journal sales at bepress, commented: “These agreements demonstrate the extent to which libraries welcome the bepress model of high quality journals at reasonable prices.”

To find out more about bepress journals, visit http://www.bepress.com/journals, and sign up for our news feed at http://works.bepress.com/bepress_journals/.