Our Story

The Crown Jewels of Sinology in Taiwan

Introduction of UDP

Concept behind the logo design of UDP: The “blue sea” beneath signifies Taiwan’s characters as a maritime country — broad-minded, tolerant and flexible. Next, UDP’s Chinese title “聯合百科” locates at the top, presented in the form of calligraphy which symbolizes our mission to promote Chinese culture. Finally, you can see the red pearl imbedded in “udp”, the abbreviation of our English title. It stands for our high-quality archives of Asian studies — the pearl of sinology.

Pearl also represents “small but fine niche market” that UDP always sticks to. UDP has been devoted itself to build professional, and in-depth databases on humanities and social sciences since 1992 when senior publishers Steve Fan and Nancy Wuu founded it. Meanwhile, developing exclusive/unique content and excellent full-text search efficiency to meet research demands is its core value. So far UDP has published one inter-databases platform of 3.2 billion characters, developed/represented dozens of multilingual databases marketing to 4 continents, 27 countries and was trusted by 1,200 libraries worldwide.

2021 Product Portfolio

● In 2009, UDP collaborated with Academia Sinica to build up the sole Full-text and Full-image databases for “Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philosophy” and “Chinese Studies” (Taiwan National Central Library) — which is a huge breakthrough to digitize the rare pictograms on Chinese ancient manuscripts.

● In 2011, UDP awarded two vital subsidies from Taiwanese government because of the technological achievements on their innovative services: “Sinica Sinoweb” and “Lionart Digital Archive”.

● In 2015-2018, “Zhuanji Wenxue Digital Archive” and “Taiwan Journals Search” launched. The former documents the history of modern China since 1962 to date, while the latter compiles 310+ top academic journals in Taiwan.

● In 2019-present, National Palace Museum authorizes UDP to digitize its 4 journals. Meanwhile, new “Taiwan Academic Classics” (TAC) platform launched, which integrates 10+ crucial databases, 3.2 billion characters, 200,000 dissertations/articles. It offers precious, exclusive content and unique added-value search to enrich users’ research treasures. Especially, National Palace Museum Journals and Academia Sinica Journals can be rated as “the crown jewels of sinology in Taiwan” and are also UDP’s representative products. Plus, TAC combines Elasticsearch tech with contemporary sinology style for interface design, leading to greater search accuracy, more friendly operating experience, and brand-new images of past data/ancient books as well, so users can enjoy a new high-tech archive with the beauty of sinology!

Honors

Profession | Leading Databases of Humanities and Social Sciences

2012

Ya! Read E-platform

supported by the concessional loan from Ministry of Culture of Taiwan

2011  

Archive of Classical Arts and Cultures Magazine

won 2 subsidies for innovative developments by Taipei City government

won “Visual Arts” subsidy by Council for Cultural Affairs, Executive Yuan in Taiwan

won “National Digital Archives Program” subsidy by Council for Cultural Affairs, Executive Yuan in Taiwan

shortlisted for “Digital Content Award” by Industrial Development Bureau, Taiwan

2007

Chinese Calligraphy and Inscription Collection

shortlisted for “Digital Innovation Award” (Digital Publications category) by the Government Information Office, Taiwan

shortlisted for “Golden Tripod Award” (Digital Publications category) by the Government Information Office, Taiwan

2010

Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology Academia Sinica Full-text Database

shortlisted for “Golden Tripod Award” (Digital Publications category) by the Government Information Office, Taiwan

Global Partners

North America — East View Information Services

Founded in 1989 at Minneapolis, East View is the leading provider of information products and services in native and translated languages, including Russian, Chinese, and Arabic databases, print periodicals, books and microforms.

UDP is their exclusive agency in Taiwan for the products below:

  • Russia and Eurasia Database: 48 exclusive online journal databases in English/Russian.

  • Cambridge Archive Edition (1841-1970): The first-hand historical documents from Foreign and Commonwealth Office of United Kingdom.

  • VoxGov: US Federal Government News and 26 million official documents.

CHINA — Social Sciences Academic Press (China)

SSAP was established in 1985, belong to Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) — one of the top think banks in Asia. SSAP is the award-winning publisher who specializes in digitizing academic journals and promoting their supreme products internationally.

UDP is their exclusive agency in Taiwan for the products below:

  • Belt and Road Initiative database: the best research platform to investigate the national strategies of contemporary China.

  • Pishu database: 6 collections of official research reports by CASS.

  • Countries, Regions and Global Governance database: Covering the international relations studies of each nation and the area studies across 5 continents.

CHINA — Centre of Ancient Documents Preservation at Gansu province

Founded in 1994, Centre of Ancient Documents Preservation at Gansu province is the multi-award winner for its devotion on preserving cultural relics and publishing ancient manuscripts.

UDP is their exclusive agency in Taiwan for the products below:

  • China Bronze and Stone Rubbings Collection: 51,800 exclusive bronze and stone rubbings from Gansu province. The collection keeps updating to date.

CHINA — Zhi Cheng Yue Pin

Based in Beijing, Zhi Cheng Yue Pin has been providing great academic resources to public libraries and universities in China since 2010. They are experienced in franchising excellent digital publications to meet the academic’s needs, such as: ancient documents, journals, e-book, etc.

Zhi Cheng Yue Pin is UDP’s general agency in China.