Cashed-up Canva heads for $5bn valuation

Canva has soared to a $US3.2bn valuation, cementing its position as Australia's most valuable tech unicorn.

Canva CEO Melanie Perkins at the Sydney headquarters: ‘We’ll be doubling down on the huge potential of Canva in the workplace’

Design software maker Canva has soared to a $US3.2bn ($4.75bn) valuation, cementing its position as Australia's most valuable tech “unicorn” as the start-up darling continues to move towards a likely IPO.

Canva on Thursday announced a fresh $US85m funding round, from Mary Meeker’s Bond investment fund, as well as investors General Catalyst, Bessemer Venture Partners, Blackbird and Sequoia China.

It brings Canva’s total funds raised to $US251m, funding its CEO Melanie Perkins told The Australian would be used to push Canva beyond its typical consumer user base and into the hands of workers.

“We'll be doubling down on the huge potential of Canva in the workplace,” Ms Perkins said. “Presentations in particular is one of our fastest-growing categories, and we’re using the power of the internet to completely kill PowerPoint presentations.”

Ms Perkins, who also co-founded the tech company as a 19-year-old when studying at the University of Western Australia, said Canva was primed to disrupt Microsoft PowerPoint, which she said was laden with dated templates and dated ClipArt. Canva has already taken significant market share from Adobe Photoshop, with some users baulking at that software’s monthly fee.

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“With Canva you can embed YouTube videos, tweets and Facebook posts to your presentations, you can bring any content from the internet in,” Ms Perkin said. “It's one of our most used features and every business person, student, teacher, every profession is creating presentations.”

Canva is also launching Canva for Enterprise, which the company says will help businesses ensure consistent use of their brand in design work.

Ms Perkins said 85 per cent of Fortune 500 companies already used Canva, so the new tools were aimed at them rather than targeting new clients since Canva “already has its foot in the door” in the majority of large corporations.

“The demand we’ve already seen from enterprises is incredible, whether it’s law firms with thousands of lawyers or franchisees who often struggle having a consistent brand image,” Ms Perkins said.

Canva is now Australia’s most valuable unicorn — a privately held fast-growing technology company — but Ms Perkins was coy about a mooted IPO, saying that “one day I'll have a more exciting answer”.

“We're in a very fortunate position. We’re really focused on our community and build our products for them. We’re well capitalised, and we’re profitable.”

Blackbird Ventures managing director Rick Baker said Canva stood out as a “unique unicorn” given it had been able to continue growth while still being profitable.

“Perkins and her team are proof you can still create global companies from the shores of Australia,” he said.

“We’re delighted to be able to reinvest in this round, and believe that Canva is still at the beginning of its journey to greatness.”