Canva valuation more than doubles to $55 billion in five months

Global graphic design platform Canva continues to be one of the fastest-growing Australian software companies, raising USD$200 million (AUD$273 million) in its most recent funding round to give it a valuation of USD$40 billion (AUD $55 billion).

The Sydney-based company was valued at US$15 billion (AUD$19.66 billion) just five months ago after receiving a US$71 million (AUD$92.5 million) investment - meaning it has more than doubled its valuation in the span of five months. 

Backed by its reach of 60 million monthly active users in 190 countries, revenue is also doubling year on year.

Canva will continue to focus on accelerating its growth, with the funding round being used to expand its current team of 2,000 employees. It is expected the number of Canva employees will reach 4,000 in the year ahead.

“Visual communication has emerged as a universal need for teams of every size across almost every industry,” said Canva co-founder and CEO Melanie Perkins.

“It has been incredible to see the continued growth of Canva across the globe over the last year.

“More than 60 million people are now using Canva for everything from launching start-ups to raising awareness for non-profits, supporting remote learning, collaborating in distributed teams, and managing global enterprise brands at scale."

The funding round was led by T.Rowe Price and joined by new and existing strategic investors including Franklin Templeton, Sequoia Capital Global Equities, Bessemer Venture Partners, Greenoaks Capital, Dragoneer Investments, Blackbird, Felicis, and AirTree Ventures.

In a letter addressed to the Canva community, Perkins states co-founder Cliff Obrecht and herself will commit 30 per cent of Canva's equity "to do good in the world" - with the money to go toward the Canva Foundation. 

“The need for both visual communication and online collaboration has become increasingly paramount and is driving Canva’s exceptional growth and adoption in teams and workplaces of every size and across many industries,” said portfolio manager of T.Rowe Price Global Technology Fund Alan Tu.

Fortune 500 companies such as Zoom, Salesforce, Marriott International, PayPal and American Airlines are also deploying Canva as enterprise customers. 

Looking ahead, the company is planning to introduce a video editor, responsive website creator and an offline mode later this year.

"We're looking forward to using Canva to manage our global brand assets and campaigns, all in one place,” said Zoom head of digital and online Wendy Bergh.

With millions of people around the world using Zoom, Canva will play an important role in helping us to continue scaling our brand and marketing efforts while empowering our rapidly growing team to create content at speed.”