STM in China | June 2023

Where in the world is Caroline?

This June, Caroline Sutton, STM's CEO, journeyed to China for two conferences, meetings and discussions around the ways we can best advance trusted research around the globe. Here, she lends a quick summary from the (windy!) Great Wall. 

After a three-year pause due to the pandemic, the Beijing International Book Fair recommenced its in-person exhibition on 15-18 June. Here, Caroline joined several other senior STM publishers at the Gala and delivered opening remarks at the first PubTech Conference, a satellite event.

She also joined a panel to discuss “The future of publishing driven by AI”, alongside Springer Nature’s Henning Schoenenberger. Several other individuals representing STM member publishers were also involved.

Whilst in Beijing, Caroline met with STM’s China Chapter to share information on STM’s strategies, the OA Dashboard, global activities, and other recent developments — and opened the floor for discussion and conversation with STM members. It was an opportunity to thank outgoing Chair Ella Chen and welcome onboard our new China Chapter Chair Ms. Xiaoling Kang.

As part of the Forum for World STM Journals, the STM China Chapter invited members and Chinese stakeholders to attend an STM introduction event. Here, Caroline shared an overview of STM, STM Trends 2027 and its upcoming Frankfurt Conference. Participants to this event included Ms. Su Wang, CAST Journal Publishing Director, Mr. Tieming Zhang, president of the Society of China University Journals, and dozens of local publishers and stakeholders.

From Beijing, Caroline journeyed to Xi’an, capital of north-western Shaanxi province, to help open the 6th Forum of World STM Journals, organized by CAST (China Association for Science and Technology), from 18th to 20th of June. This year Caroline was one of the two vice chairs of the Academic Committee of the Forum. (The chair is Prof. Wei Yang, former president of Zhejiang University, former president of NSFC). On the eve before the conference, Caroline joined the Open Science Promotion Consortium meeting as a Director of the Advisory Board. STM’s members are well represented among the membership of OSPC.