Page - 79 - in Radical Solutions and Open Science - An Open Approach to Boost Higher Education

5 WhoBenefits fromthePublicGood… 83 theuseof thirdpartyOER) topassonsuch reductions toconsumerprices.Thus, in theBrazilianexample,it ispossiblethatagrowthinOERadoptionamongpublishing housesparticipatinginthePNLDmightnotrepresentareductioninpublicspending with educational resources, or that such reduction is not a fair share of the savings thosecompaniesachieved in their costs; in that scenario, thesocialbenefitsbrought byOERwouldbecapturedbypublishinghouses, and transformed into an increase in theirprofitmargins. One cannot deny that, on the one hand,OERgenerate an equalizing effect that allowstoreduceanimportantbarrierfor theparticipationofsmallpublishinghouses in a government program as PNLD: the capital needed to invest in originalmate- rial production (capitalwhich smaller firms frequently donot have). It so happens, though, that this isonlyoneofthemanybarriers thatsmallpublishinghousesfacein suchprograms.InPNLD,forinstance,publishinghousesareresponsibleforprinting and distributing theworks, tasks that demand a robust structure and sophisticated relationshipswithothercompanies,andthat largerpublishinghousesaremuchmore prepared toundertake.That causes aparadox: in case the equalizingeffect ofOER is not enough to allow smaller firms to compete effectively in PNLD, the possible concentratingeffectofOER(whichhappens,asdiscussedinthepreviousparagraph, when thecompanycaptures thecost savingsgeneratedby theuseofOERand turns intoanincreaseofitsprofitmargin)reinforcestheasymmetryofthismarket,feeding back into the riskdiscussedhere. Theexampleof thePNLDisnot theonlyoneinwhichthis riskofprivatecapture ofOERbenefitsmanifests itself; it can alsobe seenwhen the educational resource isnot thefinalproduct tobecommercialized,butan input ina larger“package”.As such, it is also possible that, in for-profit education, a companymay start adopting OER in order to save costs (making the production of textbooks that are already includedin the tuitionfeescheaper),butendupnotpassingonthiscost reduction to consumerprices, but rather incorporating it in itsprofitmargin. In Brazil, that scenario is very feasible in higher education, which is another extremely concentrated sector in the country—the largest educational company in theworld (Cogna, formerlyknownasKroton Educacional)18 isBrazilian—aswell as in thecaseof so-called“teachingsystems”, inwhichacompanysells schools an ensemble of educational services (including not only textbooks, but also training, technological solutions, consulting, etc.), blurring the exact pricing of educational resources. 18Thecompanybecamethe largest in theworld in2014,after itmergedwithAnhanguera, another Brazilianeducational company.