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Case Study

New Editorial and Production Management System:

Elsevier

Background: Elsevier is a world-leading publisher of scientific, technical, and health information. One of Elsevier's top-selling pharmaceutical reference texts, Mosby's Drug Consult, provides the most current, unbiased, accurate, and reliable drug information available. It features nearly 2,600 pages of complete objective drug information on more than 900 generic entries and many more prescription drug products.

Strategy: In an effort to streamline editorial and production processes related to creating Mosby's Drug Consult, Elsevier retained Really Strategies to replace a legacy system that stored, managed, and delivered its pharmacologic content. The joint project team undertook an extensive analysis of the legacy system to document system capabilities, improve editorial workflow, and to architect an XML repository of drug information. Transitioning to XML helped make consumption by downstream systems as easy as possible. Detailed user requirements were documented that served as the blueprint for system creation. The platforms and technologies used to implement this system were based on standards defined by Elsevier, resulting in a system that easily fit into Elsevier's existing framework. The technical architecture incorporated J2EE development methods, which will prove to be more scalable and maintainable and offers the leverage to build on top of it for products such as electronic products or derivative texts.

Result: The entirely new platform, which is based on the convergence of XML (content) and relational data, not only saves production time and allows for customized output but also allows Elsevier the flexibility and speed to respond to market needs with new products that use the same data. Really Strategies converted Elsevier's entire content set into XML that parsed with the newly designed DTD. An intuitive user interface was crafted that allows users access to the system using a web interface. An XML editor (XMetaL) was customized and integrated with the system to support both content creation and the workflow management process. The back-end system facilitates speedy delivery to outside vendors for product creation, ensuring time-saving efficiencies in Elsevier's production department.

"This project was a very large undertaking, and it was of critical importance in our ability to provide timely, updated drug information to a variety of products, as well as a variety of output formats. Working with Really Strategies on this project was great because they understood the mission early on, took time to understand our vision for the application, and then they got the job done. We're able to fulfill our business objectives for this suite of products now without being limited by the technology. I'd work with Really again in a heartbeat."

Jabin White, executive director of electronic production at Elsevier

© 2008 Really Strategies, Inc. All rights reserved.