Frontline GMS and Ringgold Exchange Data on Library Consortia

["Laura Cox" <laura.cox@frontlinegms.com>]

26th November 2009, Towcester, UK, Beaverton, Oregon and Crystal 
River, Florida, USA -- Frontline GMS 
(http://www.frontlinegms.com)  and Ringgold 
(http://www.ringgold.com)  have entered into an agreement to 
exchange data on worldwide library consortium membership.

The new enhanced data will include over 600 library consortia in 
97 countries.  It will add value to both Ringgold's database and 
Frontline's Consortium Purchasing Directory. Both will include 
membership lists from each database which will be matched to the 
Ringgold Identifier 
(http://www.ringgold.com/products_identify.html)  for the member 
institutions.

The Ringgold database uniquely identifies over 155,000 
institutional entities that subscribe to academic journals, and 
provides metadata about their structure, consortia memberships, 
size, type, and location. Helen Henderson, Ringgold's VP of 
Marketing, Research and Development said: "Consortium information 
is highly dynamic and this collaboration will provide much more 
comprehensive and accurate data for both Frontline and Ringgold 
customers in their licensing activities. "

The fifth edition of the Directory, to be published in 2010, will 
nearly double in size and include information on consortia buying 
library management systems and other online products as well as 
the existing information on licensing online content.  This 
enhancement will include additional metadata and functionality, 
as well as all the valuable information in the Directory profiles 
such as products purchased, consortium contacts, and the policies 
and practices of the consortium.

Laura Cox, Managing Director of Frontline said: "I am delighted 
to be able to add so much more information to the Directory, the 
next edition will be vastly improved by incorporating the 
Ringgold data.  It will enable Frontline to take the Directory to 
the next level, as a must have resource."

About Ringgold
More than 40 publishers currently use Ringgold's database and its 
related services to organise their customer data, prepare 
quotations for licenses and deals, and also for market analysis. 
Ringgold partners with other publisher services companies and 
consultants, including software and service providers such as 
DataSalon, Ingenta and Thomson Reuters.

Helen Henderson, Ringgold's VP of Marketing, Research and 
Development, acts as consultant to the National Standards 
Information Organization (NISO) I2 Working Group on Institutional 
Identifiers, which is establishing standards for applications in 
e-resource publishing, e-learning, institutional repositories, 
and library management systems.

About Frontline
Frontline GMS was set up by Laura Cox in 2004 and provides 
marketing, promotion and sales consultancy services to the 
academic and professional publishing industry.  Frontline 
specialises in advising publishers, vendors and intermediaries in 
several areas, specifically marketing strategy, PR, negotiating 
with library consortia, setting pricing and business models, and 
using and analysing subscription, customer and usage data. 
Frontline also undertakes major research projects, and provides 
PR, consortia negotiation and data analysis.