Collection Development

Overview

As Rialto evolves beyond acquisitions toward a broader vision of collection analysis and development, we're excited to introduce a new suite of end-to-end workflows beginning in late 2025. These powerful, data-driven tools will support key collection development activities—starting with a Retention workflow designed to help libraries make informed, strategic decisions about what to retain, based on number of copies, usage, holdings across institutions, and configurable criteria.

For the first time, these workflows will be available to all Alma subscribers, easily enabled by consenting to share holdings data—no Rialto marketplace implementation required.

This marks a major step toward collaborative collection management, with infrastructure to support shared print initiatives and future cooperative efforts like joint acquisitions. In early 2026, we’ll follow up with a Deselection workflow, and beyond that, we'll introduce Discipline Expansion tools and more—shaped by insights from our customer focus groups and early adopters.

Roadmap

H1 2025	H2 2025	H1 2026
	Collection Development Workflows: Retention	Collection Development Workflows: Deselection

H2 2025 Enhancements

Collection Development Workflows: Retention

What's new	Highlights	Impact
As part of Rialto's evolution into a comprehensive Collection Development Solution, a new Retention workflow will be introduced. This workflow will help librarians identify physical items for retention, safeguarding essential materials from being deselected.	End-to-End Workflow: Comprehensive process from start to finish. Flows are supported by institutional holdings analytics, as well as benchmarked against selected institutions as defined by the collection manager. Actionable Recommendations: Provides actionable recommendations within Alma for efficient decision-making.	Libraries will be empowered to manage a data-driven retention strategy on an ongoing basis.

H1 2026 Enhancements

Collection Development Workflows: Deselection

What's new	Highlights	Impact
Introducing a Deselection workflow as part of the new Collection Development Workflows. This will help librarians identify physical items for potential deselection to reclaim space.	End to end workflow Flows are Backed up by Institution holdings against selected institutions as defined by the collection manager Provides actionable recommendations based on informed fulfillment, tailored to identify the best method of fulfillment.	Libraries will be empowered to manage a data-driven deselection strategy, ensuring optimal use of space while maintaining a valuable collection on an ongoing basis.