Text analytics software developed by The University of Queensland will be available as a ‘Software as a Service’ product to individual subscribers for the first time.

TopicGuide is Leximancer’s new automated approach to text analytics that uses an algorithm developed by former UQ Health and Behavioural Sciences researcher and the company’s chief scientist Dr Andrew Smith to quickly identify key trends, concepts and ideas from large pieces of text.

The Brisbane-based company was founded in 2006 by UQ’s technology transfer company, UniQuest.

Dr Smith said Leximancer’s new software app provided individual users with the opportunity to quickly process text data via a monthly subscription fee.

“Leximancer’s existing text analytics software has already been used internationally in 23 countries and more than 250 organisations, from law enforcement, higher education to government agencies,” Dr Smith said.

“The app has proven valuable for researchers and students, but it’s also effective for enabling informed decision making across social, economic, cultural and environmental sectors.”

The newest version of the software focuses on users who need a simple and efficient means of analysing large amounts of text data, but who don’t have any data science experience.

“The potential for user applications are numerous.

“Managers exploring meaning in financial and due diligence data, annual and financial reports; journalists and government looking for reoccurring themes in parliamentary and court proceedings; and even knowledge workers looking for relevance in patent-related documents,” he said.

“There was now no configuration required, and the generation of a topic index was now an automated process, whereas previous Leximancer products were targeted towards data scientists with the expertise required to undertake in-depth analysis.

The software produces an interactive topic list that allows users to understand the true meaning of text without biases with the potential to distort its meaning.

“Leximancer’s software takes just minutes to analyse text and works for most languages across traditional text formats, web content and even social media data.”

UniQuest CEO Dr Dean Moss said the latest version of Leximancer’s software would bring the benefits of automated text analysis to the consumer market.

“In this increasingly interconnected world, there has perhaps never been a greater need to quickly analyse large portions of data to derive insights and meaning from it,” Dr Moss said.

“It is fantastic to see software developed right here at UQ, and adopted widely across the globe, now transformed so that it is available to benefit even more people and provide greater impact.”

More information on TopicGuide is at https://topicguide.leximancer.com/