The major themes for this year's COAR (Confederation of Open Access Repositories) Annual Meeting and Conference, to be held at the University of Vienna, are new roles for open access repositories and international collaboration.

There will also be a special focus on China, with presenters giving an overview of the current state of open science in China.

Participants will have the opportunity to learn about international trends in open science/open access, engage with colleagues from around the world, and pursue collaborative projects with international partners.

The discussions will lay the foundations for COAR's work in 2016-17, and will centre on new functionalities for repositories, value-added services and improving the flow of research knowledge.

EIFL is one of the founding members of COAR. EIFL Open Access Programme Manager Iryna Kuchma will attend this event and will co-organize the roundtable discussion on repositories support and training.

Read Open Access and Open Research Data in China, by EIFL guest blogger Dr Ku Liping, of the National Science Library, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.