About OpenAthens.

The team at OpenAthens develops and supports identity and access management software.
We are part of Eduserv.

Our story

Our past

Our origins stem from 1995 at the University of Bath, UK. The first incarnation of our product was developed in response to a need for controlled access to online resources, funded for UK Higher Education by JISC. In 1999 Eduserv became an independent not-for-profit organisation. In 2000 the UK NHS invested in our product. In 2006 we reached two million end-users.

Our future

In 2015, Eduserv won ‘Tech Provider of the Year’ in the Charity Times Better Society Awards. Now with four million end-users, OpenAthens continues to grow. We work with seven partner organisations across the globe, which also sell and support the product. Our customer base is expansive including healthcare, education and corporates – all with a need for single sign-on to e-resources.

Our mission

We exist to remove barriers to knowledge and connect people to information. Over 2,600 organizations use our software, equating to a worldwide network of millions of end-users. We strive to improve the end-user experience of students, patrons and employees.

Our vision

To further unite the two arenas of our customer base – that of publishers (service providers) with organizations such as libraries, universities, hospitals and companies (identity providers). Together, the goal is to create a seamless end-user journey for people accessing password protected e-resources across all platforms and publications.

Mike Brooksbank, Executive Director, OpenAthens

“The commitment of the people is what I find most inspiring at OpenAthens. We have excellent staff all of whom are dedicated to the task in hand every day; it is a pleasure to see that.”

OpenAthens has a dedicated team of developers, quality assurance analysts, support analysts, trainers, account managers, sales consultants and marketers. All are driven to benefit our customers and deliver outstanding service. We are proudly part of Eduserv – IT for public good.