The conversation made Goel realise a larger gap in the academic publishing world, and he saw this as an opportunity to support researchers reach their full potential regardless of language and other barriers.
In 2001, he launched Cactus Communications, an editing company, with its brand Editage to assist researchers worldwide overcome language barriers and navigate the complex landscape of academic publishing in English. “Over the years, we have evolved into a leading global science communication and technology company dedicated to advancing the scientific research ecosystem through innovation and technology. Our objective is grounded in the end-to-end facilitation of research publication, communication, funding and discovery through cutting-edge AI products and solutions,” he says.
Cactus today collaborates with universities, academic publishers and research organisations by offering an ecosystem designed to help researchers at every step of their journey — from discovery to publication — in science communication. Over the past two decades, Cactus Communications has supported researchers with scientific, technical, and medical (STM) expertise. “We have served more than 900,000 clients across 1,100 research fields, spanning 192 countries, helping to advance their scientific pursuits. Through our flagship brand Editage, we have assisted over 500,000 researchers from more than 192 countries successfully publish their work,” says Goel, the co-founder and CEO.
The company has also built various AI-powered tools. One of them is Paperpal, an AI-based writing assistant that enables authors to produce high-quality manuscripts more effectively by providing real-time language and grammar correction, science-based insights, predictive text suggestions, paraphrasing, translation and checks for plagiarism and submission readiness. This tool surpassed one million users globally within 18 months of its launch.
Goel says the tool understands the intricacies of academic writing, ensuring precise language corrections without changing references, equations, technical terminologies.Another tool is Paperpal Preflight for Editorial Desk that assists publishers and journal editors evaluate submissions for language and technical quality. “It also performs 40 checks for research integrity to assist editorial teams. Importantly, this AI-powered tool is designed to enhance the editorial workflows, complementing the work of editors without replacing them,” he says.Cactus also has an AI-powered literature search and research reading platform called R Discovery that accelerates research discovery. The CEO explains that R Discovery provides researchers with instant access to relevant research, from a vast repository of academic articles, including peer-reviewed, open access content sourced from trusted aggregators and prestigious publishing houses. “Using a proprietary algorithm, it learns from users’ reading preferences and habits, adjusting searches to recommend the most relevant and summarised research, thereby optimising their time to focus on other crucial aspects of research,” he says.
Over the years, Cactus has established 50+ partnerships across the academic ecosystem including with Wiley, Taylor & Francis, Elsevier, Wolters Kluwer Health, Sage Publications, and the Royal Society of Chemistry.
