Nigerian startup Adaptive Atelier is building the technology infrastructure businesses need to make their digital products accessible, and to prove that accessibility actually works for the disabled people it is meant to serve.
Founded in 2024 by Toyosi Badejo-Okusanya, and headquartered across Lagos and London, Adaptive Atelier operates three connected products.
AdaptiveTest is an AI-powered scanner that analyses websites and digital products against WCAG accessibility standards; AdaptiveWiz is an accessibility API, with live Shopify and WordPress integrations that helps disabled users personalise and navigate digital experiences; and AdaptiveAlly is a marketplace connecting businesses with vetted disabled professionals who test whether accessibility fixes work in practice.
“AdaptiveTest identifies the problem, AdaptiveWiz helps fix the experience, and AdaptiveAlly validates whether the fix actually holds up for a real disabled user. That closes a loop that automated tools alone cannot close,” Badejo-Okusanya told Disrupt Africa.
She said most businesses already know accessibility matters, and are under growing pressure from customers, regulators and digital transformation to act on it.
“The gap we identified is the distance between knowing accessibility matters and actually having the infrastructure to identify, fix, and validate it,” she said.
The existing market, Badejo-Okusanya said, is fragmented across automated scanners and overlay widgets, which are quick to deploy but limited in what they can detect and fix; traditional consultancies, which offer deep expertise but little proprietary technology; and generic user-testing platforms not built around disabled testers.
“We sit at the intersection of these categories, combining AI-driven detection and remediation with structured, paid validation from disabled professionals, rather than asking a business to choose between automation and lived-experience insight,” she said.
The startup has built a community of over 13,000 disabled professionals and advocates, giving the AdaptiveAlly marketplace a ready supply side, while its website draws around 50,000 organic visits a month. It has carried out customer discovery with disabled professionals across the United Kingdom (UK), Nigeria, Canada, Germany, Morocco and the United States (US), as well as with enterprise compliance and digital leaders.
Adaptive Atelier has begun signing paying customers across cinemas, government institutions and retail platforms, and counts L’Oréal, SignHealth, Channel 4 and Phonak among the organisations it has active relationships with.
The company makes money through subscriptions for AdaptiveWiz, scoped audits for AdaptiveTest, and commission on AdaptiveAlly marketplace transactions.
“A business often enters through an AdaptiveTest audit, which surfaces the case for AdaptiveWiz as an ongoing fix, and AdaptiveAlly as the validation layer that proves it’s working,” Badejo-Okusanya said. “The priority right now is proving a repeatable path from first engagement to long-term customer before pushing for more volume.”
The startup has been self-funded to date, and is now raising a US$250,000 institutional round to support technical hiring and go-to-market execution. Badejo-Okusanya was a finalist in the Standard Chartered Foundation Women in Tech Accelerator Nigeria, and Adaptive Atelier is currently part of the Synergies Work Igniting Ideas Business Accelerator in the US, sponsored by the Mitsubishi Electric Foundation.
Nigeria remains the startup’s home market, but it is building early relationships in the UK, European Union (EU) and US, where regulation such as the European Accessibility Act and ADA requirements is creating urgency for enterprise buyers.
The road has not been without challenges. Badejo-Okusanya said product delivery slipped against expectations at one stage, forcing the company to rebuild parts of its technical roadmap and team.
“We now treat rigorous internal testing before external claims as non-negotiable,” she said.
Market education has been another hurdle, with many businesses still viewing accessibility as a compliance cost rather than a commercial opportunity, while focus has also been key.
“With genuine interest from both African and Western markets, the discipline has been choosing where to concentrate go-to-market effort first, rather than spreading a small team across two very different buyer types at once,” Badejo-Okusanya said.
