Outsourcing Journals Production

1
Outsourcing Journals Production

• Sharon Toop
• Group Production Manager, Institute of Physics
  Publishing
• John Strange
• Group Production Director, Blackwell Publishing
  Ltd

2
Agenda

• 9.30 9.45 Introduction JDS
• 9.45 10.30 Outsourcing JDS
• 10.30 11.00 Coffee
• 11.00 11.45 Vendor Selection ST
• 11.45 12.15 Breakout Groups discussion All
• 12.15 12.45 Report back from breakout groups
  All
• 1.00 2.00 Lunch
• 2.00 2.45 Working offshore ST
• 2.45 3.15 Cast study 1 (manufacturing in
  Singapore) JDS
• 3.15 3.45 Tea
• 3.45 4.15 Case study 2 (typesetting) ST
• 4.15 - Questions

3
Sharon Toop brief biography

• Joined IOP in January 1975 as an Editorial
  Assistant
• and have stayed in Bristol ever since!
• Journals Production Manager since 1985
• brief spell with responsibility for books as well
  as journals production
• overall responsibility for journals production
  strategy
• introduced use of authors (LaTEX) files for
  print production (1989)
• online publishing since 1994

4
Sharon Toop (continued)

• Continuous process development and improvement
  during a time of rapid change in STM publishing
• e-publishing developments
• outsourcing offshore (live 2001)
• growth in output (trebled 1996 2006)
• faster publication times
• cost reduction
• Group Production Manager since 2004
• ongoing responsibility for production strategy
• overall responsibility for systems and processes
  within journals division
• ATOM
• Author Services

5
Institute of Physics Publishing

• Owned by The Institute of Physics
• a charity
• a learned society
• a professional association
• Long publishing history
• Proceedings of the Physical Society of London
  (1874)
• International publisher of STM journals,
  magazines and electronic products
• Journals turnover 22.4m (budget 2006)

6
Institute of Physics Publishing (continued)

• Approx. 220 staff in Bristol
• about half work directly on journals
  (publishing/production/development/sales
  marketing/customer service)
• Overseas offices
• sales marketing offices in Philadelphia (USA)
  and Munich (Germany)
• editorial offices in Washington, DC (USA),
• St Petersburg Moscow (Russia),
• Beijing (China) and Tokyo (Japan)
• All production managed from Bristol

7
Scale of journals operation (2006)

• Regular (print e) journals
• 31 titles
• 120,000 pages
• frequencies quarterly to weekly
• Electronic-only journals
• 11 titles
• 55,000 pages
• Total output 2006
• 14,000 articles
• 175,000 pages
• and growing!

8
My experience.!

• Blackwell Publishing (1993 - ) Academic,
  Scientific and Medical Publishing
• Responsible for global production strategy
• Books, journals and electronic products
• Outsourced composition, manufacturing and
  distribution
• Pearson Longman (1978 1992) Educational
  Publishing
• Responsible for Schools Division production
  strategy
• Administration and systems for Group as a whole
• Special focus on composition and pre-press
• Books
• Outsourced composition, reproduction and
  manufacturing
• Prior to 1978
• 8 years in a small holiday guide publisher
• 3 years in sales (printing company)
• 3 years in works/factory management (printing
  company)

9
Who are Blackwell Publishing?

• The worlds leading society publisher and is over
  75 years old.
• Publish over 805 journals and 650 new books each
  year
• Academic, Medical and Professional subjects
• Partner with 665 academic and professional
  societies
• 990 staff with offices in US, UK, Australia,
  China, Denmark, Germany, Singapore and Japan
• Production facilities in US, UK, Australia and
  Japan
• Outsource 100 composition and manufacturing
• Overall sales revenue in excess of 200 million
  per annum

10
Outsourcing

• What does it mean?
• Why is it important?
• What is really core business and, thus core
  competence?
• What are the trends?
• What are the critical success factors?

11
Outsourcing

• What does it mean?
• The delegation of one or more business functions
  (or processes) to a third party, who in turn
  delivers services to agreed criteria
• Some other associated terminology
• Offshoring the utilisation of a third party
  that is offshore (i.e. not domestic), normally
  to a region where labour costs are lower
• Why is it important?
• As domestic costs rise (especially labour costs),
  one is forced to try and locate parts of the
  world where you can buy services at a lower cost
  and, sometimes better quality with reduced lead
  times.

12
Outsourcing (contd)

• Identify what is really core business and, thus
  core competence then focus internal resources
  on this which can then deliver-
• Cost savings
• Reduced lead times
• Similar (or better quality)
• Consistency
• Scaleability
• Areas that can be outsourced
• Copy editing
• Composition
• Manufacturing
• Distribution
• Customer Services
• Technology (support and development)
• Some aspects of Finance (e.g. Purchase Ledger)
• Rights and permissions
• 24 x 7 help desks
• Etc

13
Trends in outsourcing

• Offshore outsourcing becoming very common (? the
  norm)
• Europe far more experienced than US!!
• Concerns about loss of jobs domestically but.?
• Increasing breadth of outsourcing offerings
• Vendors beginning to offer end-to-end solutions

14
What are the critical success factors?

• Be very clear about What you want to outsource
• Why you want to outsource
• How you want to outsource
• Define clearly the deliverables
• The processes and procedures
• Acceptable lead times
• What you will supply
• The costs
• Payment terms
• Communications
• Disaster recovery plans
• Assessment procedures
• Arbitration