Springer Nature or the Springer Nature Group is a German–British academic publishing company created by the May 2015 merger of Springer Science+Business Media and Holtzbrinck Publishing Group's Nature Publishing Group, Palgrave Macmillan, and Macmillan Education.

History

The company originates from several journals and publishing houses, notably Springer-Verlag, which was founded in 1842 by Julius Springer in Berlin (the grandfather of Bernhard Springer who founded Springer Publishing in 1950 in New York), Nature Publishing Group which has published Nature since 1869, and Macmillan Education, which goes back to Macmillan Publishers founded in 1843.

Springer Nature was formed in 2015 by the merger of Nature Publishing Group, Palgrave Macmillan, and Macmillan Education (held by Holtzbrinck Publishing Group) with Springer Science+Business Media (held by BC Partners). Plans for the merger were first announced on 15 January 2015.The transaction was concluded in May 2015 with Holtzbrinck having the majority 53% share.

IPO attempts in May 2018 and Autumn 2020 were unfruitful due to unfavorable market conditions.

In 2021, Springer Nature acquired Atlantis Press, an open access publisher founded in Paris in 2006, focusing on scientific, technical, and medical (STM) content, and publication of conference proceedings.