The dominant model of acquiring scholarly contents at academic libraries is so called big deal where libraries subscribe to a bundle of hundreds, if not thousands of journals in a multi-year contract with fixed annual rate increase. The bid deal, started in the mid-1990s, offered a number of advantages for academic libraries and their users. However, escalating prices for these packages have become a serious issue casting doubts about the sustainability of the subscription-based model. At the moment, it appears there is no viable alternative other than pay-per-view method that is being tested at some libraries. Libraries’ budget situation will remain a key factor that might change the situation. Open access started in the 2000s as a vehicle to eliminate barriers to publishing and distributing peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles. Open access publishing is witnessing two-digit growth annually. Open access articles now occupy close to 20% of two major citation databases: Scopus and Web of Science. Google Scholar service, debuted in late 2004, is now a popular tool for discovering and accessing scholarly articles from a vast selection of journals around the world. There is a call for taking Google Scholar seriously as a potential replacement of library databases amid concerns regarding the quality of journals indexed, limited search capabilities vis-à-vis library databases, and monopoly of public goods. Escalating budget problems, rapid growth of open access publishing and the emergence of powerful free tool, such as Google Scholar, need to be taken seriously as these forces might bring disruptive changes to the existing subscription-based model of scholarly contents at academic libraries