Scope Collaborates with Taylor & Francis to Create MARC Records

Online, October 10, 2013 (Newswire.com) - Scope e-Knowledge Center (Scope), a leading provider of content enhancement and knowledge services, has recently completed an assignment with Taylor & Francis (T&F) to create MARC records for XML archives across 15 categories of publication types, including journals, books, reports and acts based on RDA guidelines for their cutting-edge digital resource, the South Asia Archive, developed in association with the South Asia Research Foundation in response to growing demand from researchers for new online research, learning and teaching resources relating to South Asia.

Scope employed its mARCat™ platform to efficiently execute the assignment and meet the expectations of T&F. Scope's mARCat solution has the ability to create MARC records per the latest RDA rules. The output was then validated by subject matter experts (SMEs), who are experienced library professionals, to ensure quality and robustness required by T&F.

The project involved encoding special characters of non-English language using MARC8 and UTF-8 character encoding, mapping of metadata in input XML files with output template fields expected by T&F, conversion of MARC records to MARCXML format as per the LOC XML schema and single XML output with all output MARC records

Gillian Howcroft, Director, eProducts commented, "From our earlier focus groups with librarians when developing the South Asia Archive, librarians requested MARC 21 records for easy integration with their library OPAC's to increase the discoverability and accessibility of this resource. As a result of this feedback, we commissioned Scope to create MARC 21 records in RDA format for the South Asia Archive, now available. We are extremely happy with the quick turnaround and quality of these records from Scope".

Tram Venkatraman, President of Scope, said, "We are happy to be associated with a leading publisher like Taylor & Francis to provide MARC services. Scope processed around 30,000 input XML files within a time period of one month to help T&F launch their new platform, the South Asia Archive, a fully-searchable digital archive resource providing instant access to over 4 million pages of rare and valuable research across the humanities and social sciences.

Commenting on this partnership, Joseph Ranjan, Associate Vice President and Head of Scope's Data Services and Business Research divisions, noted, "Scope has built mARCat based on its experience over a number of years. mARCat employs Scope's proven 'assisted automation' approach, combining proprietary technology with SME intervention to deliver high-quality, accurate results, faster for our customers."

About Taylor & Francis Group

Taylor & Francis Group partners with researchers, scholarly societies, universities and libraries worldwide to bring knowledge to life. As one of the world's leading publishers of scholarly journals, books, ebooks and reference works, its content spans all areas of Humanities, Social Sciences, Behavioural Sciences, Science and Technology, and Medicine. From its network of offices in Oxford, New York, Philadelphia, Boca Raton, Boston, Melbourne, Singapore, Beijing, Tokyo, Stockholm, New Delhi and Johannesburg, Taylor & Francis staff provide local expertise and support to their editors, societies and authors and tailored, efficient customer service to library colleagues.

About Scope e-Knowledge Center
Scope, a Quatrro Global Services company, is an award-winning provider of outsourced, cost-effective Content Enhancement Services, Data Management Services, Business Research Services and Patent Analytics for various clients across the globe. Scope, a niche knowledge services provider, has employees from various educational backgrounds and experience delivering knowledge solutions across multiple industry verticals and domains. Scope fulfils customer needs by leveraging its experience and capabilities using in-house developed proprietary technology solutions and platforms for service delivery as well as its internal needs. Scope is also the publisher of the daily newsletter Knowledgespeak, a comprehensive news service focusing on the STM information industry.

For more information, please contact:

SCOPE

Richard Kobel
Vice President,
Business Development,
USA
Scope e-Knowledge Center
+1 516 462 3555
[email protected]
www.scopeknowledge.com

Deborah Harman
Associate Vice President,
Business Development,
UK & Europe
Scope e-Knowledge Center
+44 1844 239270
[email protected]
www.scopeknowledge.com

Joseph Ranjan
Associate Vice President,
Scope e-Knowledge Center
India
+91 44 2431 4201; extn: 413
[email protected]
www.scopeknowledge.com

TAYLOR & FRANCIS

Aalia Oosman
Library Marketing & Communications Manager
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN, UK.
Tel: +44 2070 177935
[email protected]
www.southasiaarchive.com