Short answers, pulled from the story.
Elsevier was founded in 1880 as a Dutch academic publishing company. The organization adopted its name and logo from the historical Elzevir family who operated as booksellers in Leiden during the late sixteenth century.
After World War II, Elsevier executed a strategic pivot away from general publishing toward scientific journals. Profits generated by the newsweekly Elsevier funded this expansion into the scientific field starting with the weekly published on the 27th of October 1945.
Researchers submitted over 1.8 million research papers to Elsevier-based publications annually. More than 20,000 editors managed peer review and selection processes resulting in over 470,000 articles published across more than 2,500 journals.
Mathematician Timothy Gowers publicly announced his decision to boycott Elsevier on the 21st of January 2012. He cited high subscription prices for individual journals bundling subscriptions of different value and support for legislation like SOPA PIPA and the Research Works Act as primary reasons.
Germany's DEAL project included over 60 major research institutions announcing cancellation of all contracts with Elsevier effective the 1st of January 2017. By August 2017 at least 185 German institutions had cancelled subscriptions while around 200 universities granted complimentary open access until July of that year ended negotiations.