Swets Blackwell - E-Notes from Swets Blackwell

[Ann Okerson <aokerson@pantheon.yale.edu>]

Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2003 14:43:24 -0500
From: Marybeth Montgomery <mMontgomery@us.swets.com>
Subject: E-Notes from Swets Blackwell

e-notes! for Thursday, November 13, 2003
Swets Blackwell's electronic customer newsletter
____________________________________________________________________________

**Swets Blackwell's Parent Company Makes Move to Focus on Core
Subscription Services

Royal Swets & Zeitlinger, the parent company of Swets Blackwell, announced
today the sale of the publishing business and assets of Swets & Zeitlinger
Publishers and A. A. Balkema to the Taylor & Francis Group, the leading
specialist publisher of scientific, academic and professional books and
journals.

Eric van Amerongen, CEO of Royal Swets & Zeitlinger noted, "As a leading
STM publisher, Taylor and Francis is in an excellent position to grow the
Swets & Zeitlinger Publishers business further. This divestment is in
keeping with our overall strategy to spin off our smaller content
businesses (book publishing, test publishing and document systems) in
order to concentrate purely on outsourcing, distribution and information
services between libraries and other information users, and publishers."

Royal Swets & Zeitlinger's activities are incorporated in the following
divisions:  Swets Blackwell (Swets Information Services as of December
2nd, 2003), Extenza, Swets Backsets Service, Swets Farrington Document
Systems and Swets Test Publishers.  Swets Blackwell is by far the largest
of the divisions, accounting for over 90 percent of global revenues.

For more information, visit our website:  www.swetsblackwell.com

**Swets Blackwell is First Subscription Agent to Achieve COUNTER Level 2
Compliance
 
Swets Blackwell has announced this week that it is the first subscription
agent member to achieve level 2 compliance with COUNTER's international
e-journal usage standards.

With the increase in electronic content, Librarians and Information
Professionals need a way in which to measure use in a consistent format.
With the international COUNTER ( Counting Online Usage of NeTworked
Electronic Resources) Code of Practice, they now have a way to quickly and
easily measure use of the different resources they control without having
to translate and reformat the results.  This helps customers and providers
better monitor usage and how the resources are being used and the
information disseminated.

COUNTER's specifications included data elements already collected by
SwetsWise, Swets Blackwell's web-based modular service for the
procurement, access and management of subscriptions and online
information. Covering over 7660 full text publications from 272
publishers, SwetsWise' participation also dramatically increases the
number of titles and publishers for which COUNTER-compliant usage reports
are now available For more information on COUNTER compliance and
SwetsWise, contact your Regional Sales Manager at (800) 645-6595.

**Name Change

As announced in a September 2 letter to our customers, Swets Blackwell
will be changing its name effective December 2, 2003 to Swets Information
Services.  The discontinuation of the Blackwell name by 12/31/03, was a
condition of 2001 agreement signed between Swets & Zeitlinger and
Blackwell's.

While there is always a concern for loss of brand equity when a familiar
name is discontinued, please be assured that Swets and its own deeply
rooted traditions for quality subscription management will continue as the
benchmark for the subscription management industry.

To help with the transition, we have compiled a list of frequently asked
questions.  Should you have any further questions or concerns, please
contact us at marketing@us.swets.com <mailto:marketing@us.swets.com>.

1. Will the Swets Information Services electronic fund transfer
bank account change?

No.  All EFT and banking, routing and account numbers will remain
unchanged.

2. What if I need an addendum to our contract?

Should your organization require an addendum to the current Swets
Blackwell contract noting the name change, please send your request to
legal@us.swets.com <mailto:legal@us.swets.com>

3. Will the email addresses and corporate URL change? Yes.  Effective
immediately we have implemented a second email address for all employees.  
This address, 'employee first initial and last name @us.swets.com',
(@ca.swets.com for Canadian-based employees)  will work in parallel with
the @us.swetsblackwell.com address.  The @us.swetwsblackwell.com address
will remain functional until April 1, 2004.

On December 2 we will also debut our new website: www.swets.com
<http://www.swets.com>.  Corporate and regional information will be
accessible from this site.  Until 12/2/03, please continue to use
www.swetsblackwell.com.

[SNIP]
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