Global Professional Publishing, 2025-2029 Report

Report Overview

Global Professional Publishing, 2025–2029 delivers a strategic, richly detailed, and forward-looking overview of a $89 billion global market undergoing rapid and far-reaching transformation. Once anchored in print-heavy and static digital formats, the professional publishing ecosystem has evolved into a dynamic, technology-driven environment led by advanced online platforms. These platforms seamlessly integrate AI capabilities, workflow automation, and real-time analytics, redefining how professional information is produced, distributed, and monetized. Simba projects steady growth at a 4.7% CAGR from 2025–2029, sustained by the resilience and innovation of the business publishing segment.

The report examines each core segment in depth, offering richer context and actionable insight:

• Tax, Accounting & Business: The $48.6 billion segment is propelled by accelerated adoption of advanced technologies, rising complexity in compliance requirements, and a growing need for precise, real-time competitive intelligence. Digital platforms dominate, accounting for 95% of revenue, and are evolving into end-to-end ecosystems that deliver measurable efficiency gains, predictive analytics, and seamless integration into client workflows.
• Legal:Valued at $13.4 billion in 2024, this traditionally cautious sector is now embracing an AI-driven renaissance. From legal research to compliance and case management, advanced AI tools are being embedded directly into core workflows, empowering legal professionals to improve accuracy, speed, and decision-making quality while reducing repetitive administrative tasks.
• Scientific & Technical: This $13.1 billion segment thrives on sustained global R&D investment and the expansion of sophisticated analytics capabilities. Open access publishing is increasing the visibility and reach of research, while publishers deploy robust, data-rich platforms that foster global collaboration, accelerate peer review, and enhance reproducibility.
• Medical: At $10.7 billion in 2024, the medical segment’s growth reflects surging demand for authoritative digital clinical reference tools, immersive and adaptive training environments, and rigorously peer-reviewed journals. Publishers are investing in multimedia learning solutions, simulation-based training, and AI-enabled clinical decision support systems.

Major transformative forces shaping the market include the mainstream adoption of agentic AI, enabling reasoning-based, multi-step automation; the rapid expansion of open access publishing across STM disciplines; the rebalancing of global R&D leadership as China surpasses the U.S.; and the ascendance of workflow-centric platforms that unify content, analytics, and specialized tools into a single, interoperable environment.

The report delivers comprehensive competitive profiles of leading global publishers, segment-by-segment growth forecasts, in-depth analysis of M&A activity and partnerships, and a nuanced assessment of macroeconomic, policy, and technological factors that will influence professional publishing’s trajectory over the next five years.

Global Professional Publising Report Details

Professional Publishing Companies

Types of Professional Publishing

Simba Information has been tracking the professional and academic publishing markets since 1994. This report builds on that foundation with comprehensive research into each component of the professional publishing market: including Tax, Accounting, and Business; Legal; Scientific & Technical; and Medical publishing.  

Simba defines parameters for each market based on the definitions generally employed in the publishing industry. To provide the reader with a clear framework for this analysis, the following sections detail the definitions, scope, and methods underlying this report.

Tax, Accounting, and Business Publishing

Business information is the largest category of professional publishing, and is highly developed and technologically advanced. Publishers provide a wide array of specialized information for business: including content, insights, analytics, decision tools and solutions, software, and related services.

For this report, business information is defined as information that addresses the essential functions of businesses. Tax and accounting content and solutions form the core of this segment.

Products that inform general management functions are also within this definition: supporting tasks such as compliance, competitive intelligence, market analysis, pricing strategies, and product development, as well as complex decision-making functions, such as risk assessment, scenario development, and business forecasts.

Business information publishers also provide products for the large eco-system of professionals who serve businesses. That would include, for example, an accountant who is operating within an accounting firm, or one who is a solo practitioner.

Specialized financial data, such as indices and ratings, are not included in this definition, but content that adds value through analytical insights is included. Highly specialized functional areas, such as products that process payments or support complex trading functions, are not included in this definition of business information.

Legal Publishing

Legal publishers provide electronic and print content, analytics, and tools and solutions for professionals and students. The legal market has been dominated by electronic reference products, but is steadily progressing to adoption of a wider range of content-driven technology.

Customers in this segment include law firms, independent legal practices, corporate law departments, courts, libraries, and law schools. Specific customer groups include attorneys, corporate counsels, paralegals, legal assistants, corporate human resources departments, law enforcement officials, judges, court reporters, and legal aids. The academic legal market encompasses law students, academic administrators, librarians, instructors, and professors.

Legal publishers address a broad swath of professional topics, including bankruptcy, commerce law, corporate law, criminal law, estate law, family law, intellectual property, litigation, personal injury, property, trust and probate, and tax law. Also included are law practice management, dispute resolution, jury selection, legal education, and admission to the Bar.

Other areas within this segment’s scope include administrative law and regulatory practice, antitrust law, civil rights, environmental and natural resources law, employment and labor law, government and public sector law, health law, and public utility law.

Scientific & Technical Publishing

Scientific publishing includes content and services covering hard science, or science that deals with things that can be observed and measured, and some of the more analytical social sciences. Sciences include bioscience, chemistry, mathematics, and physics, as well as the wide array of sub-topics within those areas.

Note that the term life sciences is often used interchangeably with biosciences although the discipline is a subset of bioscience and is focused on areas related to human health and disease. The category of life science is evolving into an area that is covered by both scientific and medical publishing, and in this report it is included in scientific publishing.

The technical subject area encompasses upper-level computer science and all fields of engineering, including architecture, civil, electrical, and electronics engineering, and the sub-topics within those areas. Note that there is increasing crossover between scientific and technical disciplines, such as the growing area of biochemical engineering.

Scientific and technical publishing is directed to researchers and students in upper-level courses. At the organizational level, scientific and technical publishers address academic libraries, learned societies, corporations, and other research entities and institutions.

Medical Publishing

The medical publishing category encompasses content and services that address professional and student-level users. Medical publishing serves an array of healthcare professions, including physicians, clinicians, and the full spectrum of medical specialties, such as  anesthesiology, cardiology, obstetrics, neurology, and osteopathic medicine. The purview of medical publishing also includes clinical psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses, dentists, dental assistants, physical therapists, and similar professions. Medical researchers are an important target group, especially in research publishing.

Pharmaceutical reference that is used in clinical settings is also included within this market definition. This report does not include consumer health information or patient-engagement services delivered through hospital information systems.

Professional Publishing Product Formats

This report employs Simba’s definitions of product formats and aims to delineate the product landscape along those definitions. This analysis is structured around the traditional format definitions, but products continue to evolve into new forms with complex higher-value online services and tools, products that merge various formats, and platforms that combine all product forms in one destination.

The lines between specific product formats are increasingly blurring. As publishers shift to delivery via broad platforms, they are defining their business revenue along more general definitions, such as online versus print, and subscription revenue versus transactional revenue. As such, it is likely that definitions around traditional formats will eventually become less relevant for gleaning market insights.

Online Content

This product category covers a broad swath of information tools, including analytics, decision support tools, information databases, and electronic reference. This category is differentiated as adding value to content, versus offering information in electronic form.

Online content is a significant growth area within the category, and is a hotspot for product development. Publishers fine tune information to address specific use cases and add features created to improve workflow and efficiency for product users. Artificial intelligence is playing an increasing role in product development in this category.  

Journals

This product category includes print and electronic periodicals and peer-reviewed journals that are published at least three times per year. Reprint sales, author fees for open access journals, and advertising are all included as journal revenue.

The journals category has felt the impact of the transition to digital media and print subscriptions have been declining. Those declines, however, have been offset by price increases, and growth in site licenses and other revenue sources.

Abstracting & Indexing Services

Abstracting and indexing services (A&I) provide subject-focused collections of information distilled from thousands of primary sources. This is a slow-growth category, but it continues to be relevant for research and academic uses. Several of the large A&I services are Scopus (Elsevier) and Web of Science (Clarivate), both large revenue generators in the STM market. Examples in the medical realm include PsycInfo (American Psychological Association) and EMBASE (Elsevier).

For the purposes of this report, A&I is identified and defined as a distinct product format in detailed segment breakouts (e.g., Scientific & Technical, Medical, etc.). However, in top-level market share and revenue discussions, A&I revenue is combined with Online Content to reflect how publishers report this activity and to align with broader market definitions. When combined in this way, Online Content encompasses proprietary content collections, A&I services, content-based tools and solutions, and integrated online platforms.

Books

The books segment includes revenue from print and electronic books for professional, educational and reference use. Specific product forms encompass hardcover, softcover, and e-books. E-books involve books on e-readers, mobile downloads, e-book collections, and print/e-book bundles.

Other Activities

This product segment includes conferences, symposia, audio and video targeted to professional research audiences. Major audiences for this type of information include scientific and medical customers.

Elimination

Many publishers sell content that originates from other publishers, especially via A&I services and, increasingly, through online content. To avoid double-counting of revenue that arises from those transactions between publishers, Simba employs an elimination category for this analysis. This is the equivalent of adjusting for trading between divisions within a company. Wherever relevant, data tables note the impact of elimination on revenue.