SHEDL eBook Collections Oxford University Press
Framework Description
SHEDL eBook Collections Oxford University Press is an APUC agreement giving Scottish Higher Education Digital Library (SHEDL) member institutions access to the Oxford Scholarship Online eBook collection and partner presses, free of digital rights management (DRM). It is a single-lot, single-publisher agreement, not a DPS, for up to four years. It runs to 28 February 2027, with a 24-month extension option to 28 February 2029.
Context & Use Case
Library teams at SHEDL member universities and colleges use it to add Oxford Scholarship Online content to their collections under one consortium licence. It suits institutions that want scholarly books available online to all staff and students, wherever they study, without each library agreeing its own terms with OUP. Access is taken up on the terms APUC has negotiated, so there is no further competition between suppliers.
Scope of Services
Oxford Scholarship Online eBook collection Partner press content included in the agreement DRM-free online access for SHEDL members Single lot, for up to four years
Lots
Single lot
Who Can Apply
Oxford University Press is the contracted supplier and no other supplier can be added. For other university presses and academic publishers, the date that matters is 28 February 2027, when APUC either extends this agreement to 2029 or goes back to market.
Buyer Benefits
For SHEDL members the attraction is university press content licensed once for the whole consortium, with DRM-free access that suits off-campus study. Multi-year terms help library budgeting, and APUC carries the procurement and contract management work that each library would otherwise duplicate.
Next Steps
Read the APUC notice on Public Contracts Scotland (APR528358) to see how the agreement was set up. Publishers hoping to compete next time should follow APUC's SHEDL notices through 2027, prepare evidence of DRM-free licensing and consortium pricing, and line up Scottish library references before any re-procurement.
How Athena Can Help
APUC buys SHEDL content one publisher at a time, so a press hoping to win a future agreement needs a clear case well before a notice appears. Athena's framework registration team can flag consortium library agreements as they come up for renewal, and our public sector bid consultancy helps you judge whether to bid and how to price it.
For the bid itself, Athena's bid writers build responses around the evaluation criteria and check compliance before you submit.
