Jan Hajič
Also known as Jan Hajic
Jan Hajič is a computational linguist at Charles University in Prague, and his work spans machine translation and the text data used to train large language models. From 1991 to 1993, he worked as a visiting scientist at IBM Research on the Candide statistical translation project. He directed the Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics from 2003 to 2011. In 2025 he began coordinating OpenEuroLLM, a project to build open language models for European languages. As of October 2026, he is a full professor at Charles University.
- Now at
- Charles University
- Works
- 292
- Citations
- 8,443
- h-index
- 39
Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 15 October 2026.
Timeline
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1960–1984
An RNDr. thesis on robot control
He is born in Prague in 1960 and earns an RNDr. degree at Charles University in 1984, with high honors and a thesis on natural language robot control.
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1991–1993
Statistical translation at IBM
From 1991 to 1993, he works as a visiting scientist at IBM Research in Yorktown Heights, on the Candide project for statistical machine translation from French to English.
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2003–2012
Directing the Prague institute
Between 2003 and 2011, he directs the Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics, and in 2012 he becomes its vice-director.
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2016
Adjunct professor in Boulder
In 2016 he takes up an adjunct professorship at the University of Colorado Boulder, working with Martha Palmer.
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2022–2025
Coordinating the HPLT project
The Horizon Europe HPLT project, which he coordinates from 2022 to 2025, prepares textual data in 80 or more languages for large language models.
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2023
An Outstanding paper prize
At ACL 2023 in Toronto, a paper from his team on superhuman performance in natural language understanding wins an Outstanding paper prize.
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2025
The OpenEuroLLM consortium
OpenEuroLLM, a consortium project that starts in 2025, aims to build fully open language models for European languages, and he coordinates it.
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As of October 2026
Full professor at Charles University
He is a full professor of computational linguistics at Charles University in Prague and has been deputy director of its Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics since 2012.
Sources and credits
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