Country of Residence
Nigeria
Age
20
Project title
BizComplaince Ng
Project Summary: Describe your project in one sentence
BizCompliance NG is a youth-led civic-tech initiative helping Nigerian small business owners navigate complex tax and regulatory requirements through personalized compliance tasks, deadline reminders, practical learning resources, calculators, document storage, and accessible guidance—all in one mobile platform.
Website URL(s) or social media handles.
Project Category
My project is an existing project that I started
Project Stage
Pilot-Stage (We’ve tried an activity or two)
Founding Story: What was the spark that led you to start your project? What was the "Aha!" moment that led you to get started and see the potential for this to succeed?
BizCompliance NG began with a question I encountered while looking for a meaningful problem to solve through my final-year Software Engineering project: what happens after someone starts a small business and suddenly has to navigate taxes, registrations, deadlines, and changing regulatory requirements? Instead of assuming I understood the problem, I spoke to the people experiencing it. I conducted structured research with 45 SMEs in Abuja, and what they told me changed the direction of my project. 64.4% relied on paid professionals for compliance, while 51.1% had incurred penalties. Yet 91.1% used smartphones. That was my “aha!” moment. The problem was not simply that information did not exist. It existed, but was fragmented, difficult to understand, and rarely organized around what an individual business actually needed to do. I began imagining something different: what if compliance could feel less like navigating a maze and more like following a clear path? That question became BizCompliance NG and started my journey from researching the problem to building a solution that my team and I are now working to deploy.
The Problem: What problem are you helping to solve? Why does it matter to you and your community?
For many Nigerian entrepreneurs, starting a business is only the beginning. Staying compliant means understanding different taxes, registrations, deadlines, documents, and government requirements—often across multiple sources. Large companies can hire professionals to manage this complexity. For a small entrepreneur working with limited resources, the same system can become another barrier to building and sustaining a business. I saw this in my research with 45 SMEs in Abuja: 64.4% relied on paid professionals for compliance, while 51.1% reported having incurred penalties. A missed obligation can mean losing money that could otherwise support inventory, employees, or growth. This matters because small businesses should not be disadvantaged simply because essential regulatory information is difficult to navigate. When entrepreneurs cannot confidently understand the systems governing their businesses, compliance becomes something to fear or avoid. We want to help change that by making compliance easier to understand, more accessible, and more actionable for everyday entrepreneurs.
Your Solution: How are you solving this problem? Share your specific solution.
BizCompliance NG turns complex compliance requirements into clear actions that a small business owner can understand and manage from a phone. A business owner begins by providing basic information about their business. Instead of overwhelming everyone with the same regulations, the platform organizes relevant obligations into personalized tasks and deadlines. From one dashboard, users can see upcoming requirements and receive reminders before deadlines. They can learn through practical educational modules, estimate obligations using calculators for VAT, PAYE, Company Income Tax and Education Tax, and keep important compliance documents in a digital vault. I also designed Ajuri, a compliance assistant that helps users navigate information more easily. The solution was shaped around the realities of the people we want to serve. 91.1% of the SMEs in my research used smartphones, supporting a mobile-first approach. I also incorporated offline capability so that useful guidance does not depend entirely on continuous internet access. BizCompliance NG is not intended to replace accountants, lawyers, or government agencies. It gives entrepreneurs a clearer starting point by helping them answer three important questions: What applies to my business? When do I need to act? What should I do next?
Impact: How has your project created impact / made a difference so far? Or, if at an early stage, what will impact look like?
BizCompliance NG is still at an early stage, so I am careful not to confuse people who helped shape the project with people whose lives the finished solution has already changed. So far, 45 SMEs in Abuja have contributed to the research behind the solution. Their experiences helped me understand the problem and determine what entrepreneurs would need from a digital compliance tool. 97.8% responded positively to the idea of a mobile solution, including 75.6% who expressed direct interest. The project has also moved beyond its original academic setting. Insights from BizCompliance NG informed a broader policy proposal, the National SME Digital Compliance Interface, developed by my team for Nigeria's Policy Challenge 2026. Our proposal won first place nationally. Today, Joshua and I are working toward deploying BizCompliance NG. My next measure of impact is not an award; it is adoption. We want Small and Medium-sized enterprises to use the platform and to measure whether it genuinely improves their understanding of compliance and ability to act on their obligations.
Your Innovation: What is different about your project compared to other programs or solutions already out there? How is your project new or innovative?
The innovation behind BizCompliance NG is not simply putting compliance information on a phone. Information already exists. The challenge is turning scattered and technical information into something an individual entrepreneur can understand and act on. BizCompliance NG starts with the business owner. Rather than giving every user the same long list of regulations, it uses information about their business to organize relevant obligations into personalized tasks and deadlines. Those tasks connect to reminders, practical learning resources, calculators, document storage, and an accessible compliance assistant within one platform. This creates a journey from “I don't know what applies to me” to “I know what I need to do next.” Our approach is also grounded in the context we are designing for. High smartphone use among the SMEs I researched informed the mobile-first approach, while offline capability reduces dependence on continuous connectivity. Most importantly, I did not begin with a technology and search for a problem it could solve. I began by listening to small business owners. Their experiences shaped what I built. We are now carrying that same approach into deployment: test with entrepreneurs, learn from them, improve the solution, and repeat.
How many people are on your team?
2
Your team: What role(s) do your team members play? How do you share leadership with them?
Our team has two members. I founded BizCompliance NG and lead its research, product direction, design, and development. Joshua works alongside me as we prepare the solution for deployment, contributing to the decisions and work required to move it into real-world use. As we pilot, we want SME owners and compliance professionals to become active contributors who test, challenge, and help improve what we build.
What’s Next: What are the next steps you plan to take to grow or strengthen your project over the next year? If your project is still in the idea stage, describe the steps you will take over the next three months to launch or begin developing it.
Our next goal is simple: move BizCompliance NG from a solution informed by SMEs to one tested and improved with them. Joshua and I are currently working toward deploying the platform. Over the next year, we plan to run a structured pilot with small businesses in Abuja. We will onboard an initial group of SMEs, observe how they use the platform, and collect recurring feedback on what is useful, confusing, or missing. We want to measure changes in users' understanding of their obligations, confidence navigating compliance, and ability to identify and act on deadlines. We also plan to engage tax and regulatory professionals to review educational content and work with SME associations and entrepreneurship communities to reach business owners. What we learn will shape the next version of BizCompliance NG and provide evidence for future partnerships and expansion. Ultimately, we want to demonstrate that making compliance simpler can help more small businesses participate confidently in Nigeria's formal economy.
How do you encourage other people to join your project or learn about the problem you’re working on? If you have a new idea, tell us how you will do this in the future.
For me, engagement began with listening. Before deciding what BizCompliance NG should become, I asked 45 SMEs in Abuja about their experiences with compliance, the barriers they faced, and whether a digital solution would actually be useful. Their responses shaped the direction and features of the project. The initiative has since grown beyond something I am building alone. Joshua joined the team, and we are now working together toward deploying the solution. I also helped take the problem beyond the product. Through Nigeria's Policy Challenge 2026, my team and I translated insights behind BizCompliance NG into a proposal for a National SME Digital Compliance Interface, exploring how the challenge could be addressed at a broader systems level. Our next step is to move from listening to deeper participation. We want SMEs in our pilot to test the platform, identify weaknesses, and influence improvements, while compliance professionals and SME communities contribute expertise and connections. Our goal is not simply to gain users. It is to bring more people into solving the problem with us.
