ANN ARBOR, Mich. and JERUSALEM, Jan. 26, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Information industry leaders ProQuest and Ex Libris^® Group understand that researchers and librarians search for and manage content using solutions from different providers. Today, the two companies announced a collaboration to make their key services work better together to improve user experience and support customer choice. The most immediate benefit for mutual customers will be the indexing of dozens of ProQuest's most widely used content databases in the Ex Libris Primo^® Central Index of scholarly electronic resources. When the first stage of work is completed, ProQuest's ebrary^® and EBL-Ebook Library^® collections will become discoverable by all Primo Central users as well. 

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While ProQuest's Summon^® discovery solution includes this content already for its many customers, enabling its full indexing in Primo Central will further enhance its discoverability to users of the Ex Libris Primo^® discovery and delivery solution.  To expand choice even further, the companies will also work together to identify and investigate additional points of integration with their respective library management software solutions.  Users of the Ex Libris Alma^® unified resource management service, and libraries using the Voyager^® or Aleph^® integrated library system will be able to deploy ProQuest's Summon to make their library collections discoverable, just as Primo can be accessed by ProQuest management customers.  As part of this new initiative, the companies will focus on improving those interactions and further enhance the user experience across their respective discovery and library management solutions. 

Ex Libris Alma customers can look forward to operational improvements, including the availability of Patron Driven Acquisition (PDA) of titles from ebrary and EBL-EBook Library—allowing efficient end-user input into collection development and reducing work for librarians. Future plans include facilitating more streamlined acquisitions workflows and the integration of holdings updates that will help mutual customers reduce operational costs and benefit from automated and more efficient processes.

ProQuest Intota^™ customers will have the benefit of knowing that interoperability on their behalf is part of the ongoing development focus. This work will evolve through continued collaboration and customers' input—all with a common goal of empowering libraries to best meet their patrons' needs and support their institutions' mission.

"This agreement with ProQuest is an important step forward for Ex Libris and the 2,000-strong community of Primo institutions, and furthers our promotion of content-neutral discovery," remarked Matti Shem Tov, Ex Libris President and CEO. "Enabling Primo Central users to discover and access the extensive scholarly materials contained in ProQuest's journals and e-books collections will improve the discovery experience for millions of students and researchers worldwide. At the same time, the streamlined library management processes offered through enhanced integration of ProQuest services with Alma will boost the efficiency of library operations for the growing Alma community."

"ProQuest is accelerating the interoperability of its products and services on all fronts," said Kurt Sanford, ProQuest CEO. "We're aiming to ensure that no matter where a researcher starts, connecting with our content is simple and seamless. When users start with a ProQuest service, we want to be sure that they can go anywhere and discover any content effortlessly."

Collaboration activities between ProQuest and Ex Libris are commencing immediately and will be ongoing. For more information, visit www.proquest.com or www.exlibrisgroup.com.

About Ex Libris (www.exlibrisgroup.com)Ex Libris is a leading provider of automation solutions for academic, national, and research libraries. Offering the only comprehensive product suite for electronic, digital, and print materials, Ex Libris provides efficient, user-friendly products that serve the needs of libraries today and will facilitate their transition into the future. Ex Libris maintains an impressive customer base consisting of thousands of sites in more than 90 countries on six continents.

Dedicated to developing creative solutions in close collaboration with customers, Ex Libris enables libraries to maximize productivity and efficiency and, at the same time, greatly enhance the user experience. By empowering users to discover and obtain the information they need, libraries ensure their position as the bridge to knowledge.

For more information about Ex Libris Group, see our website, join us on Facebook, view our videos, and follow our Twitter page.

About ProQuest (www.proquest.com)ProQuest connects people with vetted, reliable information. Key to serious research, the company's products are a gateway to the world's knowledge including dissertations, governmental and cultural archives, news, historical collections and e-books. ProQuest technologies serve users across the critical points in research, helping them discover, access, share, create and manage information.

The company's cloud-based technologies offer flexible solutions for librarians, students and researchers through the ProQuest^®, Bowker^®, Dialog^®, ebrary^®, EBL^® and Serials Solutions^® businesses – and notable research tools such as the Summon^® discovery service, RefWorks Flow™, Pivot™ and Intota^®, a new library services platform. The company is headquartered in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with offices around the world.

SOURCE ProQuest

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