These two Nigerian immigrants want to fix software documentation for over one million tech professionals
Patrick Giwa never imagined his transition from academia to business analysis would lead him to co-found a tech startup.
As a Nigerian immigrant navigating career pivots and imposter syndrome in the UK, there was no roadmap to follow. But everything changed in April 2022, when amid his experiments with Artificial Intelligence (AI), he launched an AI-powered Chrome extension that allows other business analysts to generate user stories.
To his surprise, it gained 2,000 users in just four weeks. This unexpected traction sparked his interest in solving more problems for people with AI.
A few months later, over a conversation with Nelson Uzenabor, a Nigerian serial entrepreneur with experience building tech products, the duo bonded over the potential of tools to boost tech professional productivity and decided to do something about it.
Both frustrated by the time wasted on repetitive tasks, they were keen on figuring out if AI tools could streamline processes for tech professionals.
By early 2022, Uzenabor and Giwa had built a Minimum viable product (MVP) and launched Pace AI. Their goal: create a lightweight solution to help professionals streamline tedious documentation tasks, from writing user stories to backlog grooming.
But why software documentation?
A shift in how we document workflows
IT project failures are a pervasive problem in the UK, with 76% of projects failing and costing a staggering £37 billion annually. Misalignment, resulting from inadequate documentation, poor data, and unclear objectives, is a major contributing factor, accounting for 56% of these failures.
For tech professionals, software documentation helps improve transparency, efficiency, and informed decision-making. By investing in clear, concise, and up-to-date documentation, teams can foster a culture of collaboration, reduce risks, and consistently deliver high-quality products that meet evolving customer needs.
For instance, the use of user stories in Agile methodologies has changed how development teams work, focusing on the end user’s needs and enabling teams to adapt as projects evolve.
Today, business analysts can collaborate closely with stakeholders and developers, gathering and refining requirements in real time. Yet, even with this flexibility, managing documentation—like Business Requirements Documents (BRDs)—remains a challenge.
By using a product like Pace AI to automate the creation of user stories or flow charts, tech professionals can reduce their workload, allowing them to keep up with shifting requirements and deliver real value.
A layman might wonder what makes Pace AI different from a general AI chatbot, Uzenabor believes the difference lies in the specificity of the AI parameters and fine-tuning of the AI models for IT professionals.
While chatbots like ChatGPT offer broader functionality, Pace AI is built to cater for the unique needs of product managers and business analysts, offering specialised tools that eliminate repetitive work.
This focus on this niche use case means users can generate high-quality outputs without mastering complex prompts.
According to Giwa, Pace AI also stands out by automating documentation without compromising privacy.
“We built the platform to process only the essentials—no sensitive data is stored. This makes it a perfect fit for data-sensitive industries where security is non-negotiable,” he explained.
Tried by fire and scaled through
Within a month of launching, they achieved £5,000 in monthly recurring revenue. Success it appeared came quickly, but not without challenges. Just as they hit 5,000 users, Giwa and Uzenabor's new startup were a victim of chargeback fraud — a scenario where a customer intentionally disputes a credit card charge with their bank after receiving the goods or services.
Chargeback fraud can be first-party fraud, where the fraudster is the actual customer, or third-party fraud, where the fraudster uses a fake identity. In PaceAI's case, these were mostly third-party fraudsters. Forced to halt operations temporarily, they revamped their payment systems to safeguard their growing user base.
Bootstrapping the company with personal savings, meant every pound mattered, and their persistence paid off. Their efforts were validated as they returned to a supportive community of users.
For these two Nigerian founders, building Pace AI has been as much about solving problems as it is about rewriting their own stories.
“We didn’t have a playbook, all we had was the passion to help others and the grit not to die as a startup. We worked constantly working till late relying on coffee and energy drinks,” Uzenabor said.
Since launching, Pace AI has expanded to 35 tools with over 30,000 users, each designed to enhance productivity and reduce the burden of documentation for tech professionals. The platform is also preparing for deeper integrations with popular software like Jira and Google Docs to further streamline workflows.
But the founders’ ambitions go beyond software. Uzenabor and Giwa want Pace AI to become synonymous with workflow automation.
“Google owns search. We want to own software documentation,” Uzenabor said with conviction.
By 2030, the team’s goal is to reach one million users, with a focus on empowering professionals across Africa, Europe, and beyond.
“It’s not just about numbers. It’s about the real-world impact we can create,” Uzenabor, said.