OCLC PICA

OCLC PICA was a European provider of library software and services based in Leiden, which has emerged from a collaboration between the Dutch Pica Foundation and the U.S. Online Computer Library Center ( OCLC ). 2007 OCLC PICA has been completely taken over by the Online Computer Library Center. Since the transactions are carried under the name OCLC EMEA Regional Council ( EMEARC ), the English acronym "EMEA " stands for "Europe, the Middle East and Africa" ​​.

History

The Pica Foundation was founded in 1969 as an initiative of Leiden University Library, the Royal Library of the Netherlands and other university libraries in life to promote the common cataloging and automation. The acronym PICA stands for Project of Integrated Catalogue Automation. 1986 got Pica as a Foundation Center for Library Automation own legal status, which was transformed into a foundation in 1997. In December, along with the OCLC Pica B. V. ( roughly comparable to a German GmbH) founded that eventually through a merger with the authority responsible for Europe, Middle East and Africa department of the organization OCLC OCLC PICA was founded in January 2002. 2005 OCLC had a 60% majority of the shares of OCLC PICA, while Pica Foundation held 40%. The Pica Foundation was in turn supported by the NBLC Association and the SURF Foundation. In 2005, OCLC PICA with the former Siemens subsidiary Sisi Informationssysteme GmbH ( Germany ) and Fretwell - Downing Informatics Group ( UK ) Other service providers and software publishers in the library system. Mid-2007, OCLC acquired the remaining shares of OCLC PICA and thus is now the sole shareholder of the organization. At the end of 2007, all OCLC PICA branches were renamed OCLC. 2011, the company was taken over BOND.

Through the acquisitions of 2005, the product range of OCLC PICA had expanded considerably. Addition to the traditional local and network system, it also includes software and solutions in the areas of inter-library loan, portals and link resolver. OCLC PICA is also responsible for the distribution of OCLC services and products (WorldCat, CONTENdm, Netlibrary ), was responsible in the European area.

In German-speaking OCLC PICA was mainly due to the Pica software for central and local library databases known ( among other things as OPAC). In Germany, the software is used by the German National Library and the library networks GBV, HeBIS and SWB. Other partners include the National Library of Australia, the interlibrary loan V3 in the UK, the French general catalog SUDOC and the Dutch Union Catalogue, which is operated simultaneously at OCLC PICA. The data format used by default in the Pica - Pica software is internally or its representation Pica3 for cataloging.

OCLC EMEA employs more than 250 people in Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and France, of which about 170 are employed in the development and support.

Main competitor of OCLC EMEA is the Ex Libris Group, which offers comparable products among others with Aleph and MetaLib.

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