Steven Miron, Senior Vice President, Scientific, Technical, Medical and
Scholarly, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., (NYSE:JWa, JWb) has announced the
retirement of longtime executive Bob Campbell.
Campbell, who will step down from his post as senior publisher, has
worked in the publishing industry for the last 44 years, ever since he
graduated with a degree in zoology from Aberdeen University in 1968 and
joined Blackwell Scientific Publications (BSP). In building the BSP
publication business, Campbell published his first two journals, Freshwater
Biologyand the Journal
of Biogeography, in 1971.
Campbell became editorial director in 1978 and rose through the ranks to
become President of Blackwell Publishing and Senior Publisher after
Wiley’s acquisition of Blackwell in 2007.
“Bob’s contributions to Wiley and the world of scholarly communication
have been truly exceptional,” said Stephen M. Smith, President and CEO
of Wiley. “With vision and passion and a knack for building enduring
partnerships, Bob led Blackwell Science (and now Wiley) to become the
world’s leading publisher for professional and learned societies, a
position that has contributed so much to our success both in the past
and today as we transform our business in this digital age.”
"We will miss Bob’s energy, wit and wise counsel. Our industry owes him
an enormous debt of gratitude,” said Smith.
“I have loved my career in publishing and my time at Wiley,” said
Campbell. “However, after 44 years it is time to take a step back, spend
more time with my wife and family and enjoy my free time pursuing my
interests outside publishing including fly fishing, conservation and
farming. I am also sure I will be missing the great colleagues I have
had a chance to work alongside for the last many years.”
In addition to his positions at Wiley, Campbell has served as president
of the International
STM Publishers Association, one of the co-founders and chairman of CrossRef,
chair of INASP,
an international development organization whose mission is to improve
access, production and use of research information and knowledge in
developing countries, and served on the Finch group, which provided
recommendations on expanding access to published research findings.
Most recently, Bob has been a highly influential voice in the Open
Access debate, persuasively championing the importance of maintaining
sustainable publishing models that ensure quality and balance the needs
of a variety of stakeholders in multiple geographies and disciplines –
researchers and their funders, research institutions, scholarly and
professional societies, and commercial and not-for-profit publishers.
