This section provides information on the systems that Higher Education institutions use to manage the research lifecycle. These are primarily:

Institutional repositories:

Institutional repositories (IR) - online archives for storing, preserving research “outputs” such as publications, theses and datasets. Institutional repositories support the Open Access agenda through providing publisher compliant digital access via Green and Gold Open Access.

Data repositories:

Institutions may use a single IR to manage publications and data. However, due to the differing storage requirements many may use a separate data repository for storage and access to datasets.

Current Research Information Systems (CRIS) / Research Information Systems (RIMS):

The two terms are used largely interchangeably within the market. CRIS or RIMS are used to manage the full research lifecycle to include all institutional information relating to resaerch in one place. They may include interlinked metadata relating to:

• Researcher profiles
• Grant applications / awards
• Publications
• Supporting information on research impact / research environment
• Teaching responsibilities

Interoperability is at the heart of such systems with most providing data exchange between other institutional systems such as HR, finance and project management systems. Some systems may provide integrative institutional repository functions whilst others will offer interoperability with third party IR solutions.

Click here to view details of institutional repositories, CRIS and RDM systems used by different UK HE institutions.

Note that data is correct as of Summer 2023 and that blank fields does not necessarily mean that the institution concerned is not using a particular kind of system, rather that information is not currently available.

If you wish to update / amend details on behalf of your institution, please submit a data change by completing our brief updates form

euroCRIS maintains a (work-in-global -still progress) Directory of Research Information Systems. For more information on euroCRIS Directory of Research Information Systems (DRIS) project:- https://www.eurocris.org/dris-project.

Jisc (Sherpa) OpenDOAR provides a directory on institutional repositories

Market shares in July 2023

A 'snapshot' (July 2023) of UK Higher Education institutions and the repositories and Research Information Management (RIM) systems/CRISs they use is available as a spreadsheet**

• Eprints
• Dspace
• Haplo (Cayuse)
• Pure (Elsevier)
• Esploro (Ex Libris)
• Figshare
• Samvera
• Worktribe

Research Outputs Repository Systems Purchasing Service Buyer’s Guide (includes an Appendix: Technical Requirements)

There are (December 2020) eight accepted repository providers with other suppliers in the process of applying.

4Science s.r.l. (DSpace and DSpace-CRIS)
Digital Science & Research Solutions Inc (Figshare)
Elsevier BV (Mendeley Data)
Ex Libris (UK) Ltd (Esploro Research Repository)
Jisc Services Ltd (Research repository)
MyScienceWork (Polaris)
Reach Solutions (DSpace or custom solutions)
Haplo (Haplo Repository)

Details of the DPS and how to procure through it can be found at the service webpage:

https://www.jisc.ac.uk/research-outputs-repository-systems-purchasing

How does it work?
The DPS sets out minimum standards that suppliers must comply with in order to have their product included. These are set out in the Appendix to the Buyer’s guide which can be downloaded from the service webpage. Jisc members (which include all publicly funded UK universities) can use the service to run mini competitions with suppliers, using standard templates provided, and adding additional requirements of their own, if necessary. Jisc will administer the process on behalf of the member, who can use their own criteria to identify their preferred supplier. If a supplier is selected, Jisc notifies all bidders of the result and contracts are between the preferred supplier and member are drawn up.

Benefits and opportunities for Jisc members
• The framework reduces the procurement burden for members: it facilitates a light touch procurement process for members, as OJEU requirements will have already been fulfilled. Members can focus solely on their specific requirements.
• Members can be confident that the services included use a clear set of sector standards
• The market for such services becomes more transparent, efficient and effective.
• Members get better value for money.

Opportunities for repository suppliers
Repository suppliers can apply to join the DPS at any time. Details can be found here https://procontract.due-north.com/Advert?advertId=7d070ad9-8e5c-ea11-80ff-005056b64545

Any queries, contact repositories-dps@jisc.ac.uk

Research data management toolkit (Jisc)
This toolkit aims to support you through the entire lifecycle of research data management (RDM). It explains what you should consider and signposts resources from a wide range of websites and organisations.

Practices and Patterns in Research Information Management.Findings from a Global Survey.Rebecca Bryant, Anna Clements, Pablo de Castro, Joanne Cantrell, Annette Dortmund, Jan Fransen, Peggy Gallagher, Michele Mennielli. OCLC and euroCRIS OCLC RESEARCH REPORT 2018

“This report contributes to a growing body of work from OCLC to better understand RIM practices, including their regional differences, as well as the growing interoperability imperative between siloed sources of data—both internal and external. Of particular interest to library readers of this report is the documentation of how university RIM workflows are increasingly intersecting with those in the library, particularly as it relates to the relationship with institutional and data repositories.

**Research information management systems – a new service category?** Most of the information below is taken from a 2014 blog post by Lorcan Dempsey. It serves as a good introduction
(What follows is an extract for Lorcan Dempsey's blog). Click on the link above to read the complete blog post

October 26, 2014 Lorcan Dempsey
It has been interesting watching Research Information Management or RIM emerge as a new service category in the last couple of years. RIM is supported by a particular system category, the Research Information Management System (RIMs), sometimes referred to by an earlier name, the CRIS (Current Research Information System).

For reasons discussed below, this area has been more prominent outside the US, but interest is also now growing in the US. See for example, the mention of RIMs in the Library FY15 Strategic Goals at Dartmouth College.
Research information management
The name is unfortunately confusing – a reserved sense living alongside more general senses. What is the reserved sense? Broadly, RIM is used to refer to the integrated management of information about the research life-cycle, and about the entities which are party to it (e.g. researchers, research outputs, organizations, grants, facilities, ..). The aim is to synchronize data across parts of the university, reducing the burden to all involved of collecting and managing data about the research process. An outcome is to provide greater visibility onto institutional research activity. Motivations include better internal reporting and analytics, support for compliance and assessment, and improved reputation management through more organized disclosure of research expertise and outputs.

A major driver has been the need to streamline the provision of data to various national university research assessment exercises (for example, in the UK, Denmark and Australia). Without integrated support, responding to these is costly, with activities fragmented across the Office of Research, individual schools or departments, and other support units, including, sometimes, the library. (See this report on national assessment regimes and the roles of libraries.)

Some of the functional areas covered by a RIM system may be:

• Award management and identification of award opportunities. Matching of interests to potential funding sources. Supporting management of and communication around grant and contracts activity.
• Publications management. Collecting data about researcher publications. Often this will be done by searching in external sources (Scopus and Web of Science, for example) to help populate profiles, and to provide alerts to keep them up to date.
• Coordination and publishing of expertise profiles. Centralized upkeep of expertise profiles. Pulling of data from various systems. This may be for internal reporting or assessment purposes, to support individual researchers in providing personal data in a variety of required forms (e.g. for different granting agencies), and for publishing to the web through an institutional research portal or other venue.
• Research analytics/reporting. Providing management information about research activity and interests, across departments, groups and individuals.
• Compliance with internal/external mandates.
• Support of open access. Synchronization with institutional repository. Managing deposit requirements. Integration with sources of information about Open Access policies.

To meet these goals, a RIM system will integrate data from a variety of internal and external systems.Typically, a university will currently manage information about these processes across a variety of administrative and academic departments. Required data also has to be pulled from external systems, notably data about funding opportunities and publications.
Products
Several products have emerged specifically to support RIM in recent years. This is an important reason for suggesting that it is emerging as a recognized service category.

• Pure (Elsevier). “Pure aggregates your organization’s research information from numerous internal and external sources, and ensures the data that drives your strategic decisions is trusted, comprehensive and accessible in real time. A highly versatile system, Pure enables your organization to build reports, carry out performance assessments, manage researcher profiles, enable expertise identification and more, all while reducing administrative burden for researchers, faculty and staff.”
• Converis (Thomson Reuters). “Converis is the only fully configurable research information management system that can manage the complete research lifecycle, from the earliest due diligence in the grant process through the final publication and application of research results. With Converis, understand the full scope of your organization’s contributions by building scholarly profiles based on our publishing and citations data–then layer in your institutional data to more specifically track success within your organization.”
• Symplectic Elements. “A driving force of our approach is to minimise the administrative burden placed on academic staff during their research. We work with our clients to provide industry leading software services and integrations that automate the capture, reduce the manual input, improve the quality and expedite the transfer of rich data at their institution.”

Pure and Converis are parts of broader sets of research management and analytics services from, respectively, Elsevier (Elsevier research intelligence) and Thomson Reuters (Research management and evaluation). Each is a recent acquisition, providing an institutional approach alongside the aggregate, network level approach of each company’s broader research analytics and management services.

Symplectic is a member of the very interesting Digital Science portfolio. Digital Science is a company set up by Macmillan Publishers to incubate start-ups focused on scientific workflow and research productivity. These include, for example, Figshare and Altmetric.

Other products are also relevant here. As RIM is an emerging area, it is natural to expect some overlap with other functions. For example, there is definitely overlap with backoffice research administration systems – Ideate from Consilience or solutions from infoEd Global, for example. And also with more publicly oriented profiling and expertise systems on the front office side.

include:
Elements (Symplectic)
Pure (Elsevier)
Converis (Thompson)
Haplo Research Manager
Worktribe