# Narjès Boufaden

> Narjès Boufaden is a Montreal-based computational linguist and the founder of Keatext. Her research on conversational language led to an AI services business in 2010 and a cloud-based feedback analytics product in 2015. She studied under Guy Lapalme and Yoshua Bengio, has mentored AI startups, and writes and speaks about customer experience, generative AI and bias.

- **Role:** Founder and CEO at Keatext
- **Organizations:** Keatext, Université de Montréal, Université Laval, University of Ottawa, Centre de recherche informatique de Montréal, École de technologie supérieure, Techstars Montreal AI, Forbes Technology Council
- **Education:** PhD in Computational Linguistics, Université de Montréal, Master’s degree in Computer Science, Université Laval
- **Known for:** Founded Keatext in 2010 and transitioned it from services to a software product in 2015., Contributed more than 15 scientific publications on natural language processing and conversational text mining., Her Quebec government project received an Octas innovation award in 2012.

## Career timeline

- **2003** — Published an ontology-based semantic tagging paper at ACL, using maritime search-and-rescue telephone transcripts.
- **2004** — Co-authored research on informative words in spoken texts with Yoshua Bengio and Guy Lapalme.
- **2007** — Co-authored research on predicting user satisfaction in human-machine dialogues.
- **2010** — Founded Keatext as an AI professional-services business.
- **2012** — A Quebec government information-analysis project earned an Octas innovation award.
- **2015** — Shifted Keatext to a cloud-based feedback analytics product; Charles-Olivier Simard joined as partner and CTO.
- **2019** — Gave a Growth Summit keynote at Collision in Toronto.
- **2020** — Spoke at WomenTech Global Awards about bias, fairness and diversity in AI.
- **2022** — Discussed customer journeys and feedback analytics on the Midstage Startup Momentum Podcast.
- **2025** — Published a QuestionPro article on generative AI in customer experience and served on a Université de Montréal entrepreneurship jury.

## Achievements

- Founded Keatext in 2010 and transitioned it from services to a software product in 2015.
- Contributed more than 15 scientific publications on natural language processing and conversational text mining.
- Her Quebec government project received an Octas innovation award in 2012.
- Delivered a Growth Summit keynote at Collision 2019.
- Selected among 10 VivaTech Female Founder Challenge finalists in 2020, according to her professional profile.

## Latest updates

- **2025-11** — Served on the alumni jury for Université de Montréal’s Impact Millénium Québecor entrepreneurship competition.
- **2025-01** — Published a QuestionPro guest article about generative AI’s strengths in summarizing conversations and the need for quantitative customer-experience analytics.

## Links

- Website: https://www.keatext.ai/en/our-team-and-history/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/narjesboufaden/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/narjes-boufaden
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-10-14