Leading Autism Science and Advocacy Organization Will Use Information on Research Metrics to Understand Return on Investment of Funding

IPSWICH, Mass.— June 17, 2014—Autism Speaks, the world’s leading autism science and advocacy organization, has purchased PlumX™ to track the metrics on the research outputs that its funding has helped create. PlumX fromPlum™ Analytics, an EBSCO company, will give Autism Speaks powerful and actionable information about the more than $200 million in autism research that it has funded since it was founded.

PlumX is an impact dashboard that provides information on how research output is being utilized, interacted with, and talked about around the world. It delivers a more complete picture of research and answers questions about research impact by gathering “altmetrics” or “alternative metrics” which are metrics around artifacts such as articles, clinical trials, blog posts, grants, books, theses/dissertations, webpages and more. The altmetrics are then categorized into Usage, Captures, Mentions, Social Media and Citations.

Ed Clayton, Autism Speaks senior director for strategic funding and grants administration says, “We’re very excited to integrate the PlumX dashboard into our existing research assessment strategies. With the new information that Plum Analytics provides we will be able to tell the stories of impact behind our research and better share these with others in the autism community.”

With PlumX, Autism Speaks will be able to gather and analyze metrics, at several levels including: Grant ID, Researcher, Institution, Research Topic, Grant Type and Geography. This will give Autism Speaks powerful and actionable information that can then be used to tell the stories of impact behind its work and give the organization a better sense of the return on investment of specific funding. Autism Speaks also plans to make the data available so that donors will see the impact of the funds they have donated.  Researchers can receive credit for what they have done and newer researchers will gain visibility.

Plum Analytics President Andrea Michalek says that Autism Speaks is taking a pioneering step in using metrics to track their research with PlumX. “We are really excited about working with Autism Speaks to implement their research grants with new metrics that can benefit the whole research community by enhancing the way we look at research impact and scholarly communication.”

Plum Analytics is the only company synthesizing metrics data for custom analysis for each organization and for publishers and presenting the metrics in a variety of ways including data visualizations, dashboards, and widgets. For more information about PlumX and Plum Analytics, please visit: www.plumanalytics.com.

About Autism Speaks
Autism Speaks is the world’s leading autism science and advocacy organization. It is dedicated to funding research into the causes, prevention, treatments and a cure for autism; increasing awareness of autism spectrum disorders; and advocating for the needs of individuals with autism and their families. Autism Speaks was founded in February 2005 by Suzanne and Bob Wright, the grandparents of a child with autism. Mr. Wright is the former vice chairman of General Electric and chief executive officer of NBC and NBC Universal. Since its inception, Autism Speaks has committed more than $500 million to its mission, the majority in science and medical research. Each year Walk Now for Autism Speaks events are held in more than 100 cities across North America. On the global front, Autism Speaks has established partnerships in more than 40 countries on five continents to foster international research, services and awareness. To learn more about Autism Speaks, please visit www.AutismSpeaks.org.

About Plum™ Analytics
Plum Analytics is a pioneer in the field of altmetrics, revealing research interest and usage beyond traditional measures. The company helps individuals and organizations that use, fund, support, perform, publish or analyze research obtain a broad-spectrum view of interest and usage in research through both immediate and historical perspectives. Plum Analytics gathers metrics about research from dozens of scholarly sources, media channels and social media tools, and categorizes them into Usage, Captures, Mentions, Social Media and Citations. The complete PlumX Suite of five products delivers research output information based on the unique needs of each type of PlumX user. To learn more, visit http://www.plumanalytics.com.

About EBSCO Information Services
EBSCO Information Services (EBSCO) is the leading discovery service provider for libraries worldwide with more than 8,000 discovery customers in over 100 countries. EBSCO Discovery Service™ (EDS) provides each institution with a comprehensive, single search box for its entire collection, offering unparalleled relevance ranking quality and extensive customization. EBSCO is also the preeminent provider of online research content for libraries, including hundreds of research databases, historical archives, point-of-care medical reference, and corporate learning tools serving millions of end users at tens of thousands of institutions. EBSCO is the leading provider of electronic journals & books for libraries, with subscription management for more than 360,000 serials, including more than 57,000 e-journals, as well as online access to more than 700,000 e-books. For more information, visit the EBSCO website at: www.ebsco.com. EBSCO Information Services is a division of EBSCO Industries Inc., a family owned company since 1944.

For more information, please contact:

Kathleen McEvoy
Vice President of Communications
(800) 653-2726 ext. 2594
kmcevoy@ebsco.com