From the beginning we had this Venn diagram: on one side is creativity and on the other is productivity. And you may have guessed it: Canva is located right in the center. We really believe that people on the productivity side actually want to be more creative, and people on the creative side actually want to be more productive. And so we really thought that was the sweet spot: it was a huge gap in the market that we saw early on, and it's what we continue to invest very heavily in.
And you? How does Canva use Canva?
Extremely extensive, for literally everything. Our engineers do their technical documents in Canva, we do it with all hands, I create all my product models in it. I've used it for decision decks and vision decks and onboarding, hiring and recruitment. Name something, we use Canva very extensively for it.
Your peak valuation in 2021 was $40 billion. A year later this was reduced to $26 billion. What happened?
I think it was purely the macro shift in the market. During that time, Canva has continued to grow rapidly, both in terms of revenue and active users. We have also been profitable for seven years, despite the market [switched to caring] more about profitability, luckily we were already in that trend. Markets will appreciate different things over time, and markets will be frothy and then not frothy. We are always building a strong, sustainable, well-founded company that serves our community. So it is not a particular concern what happens in the market.
You've committed 30 percent of Canva (the majority of your and Obrecht's wealth) to do good in the world. What does that mean for you?
It seems completely absurd that we have the same prosperity as all over the world, and that there are people who still do not have their basic human needs met. The first step we have taken is the collaboration with GiveDirectly, where we give money directly to people living in extreme poverty. [Canva has so far donated a total of $30 million to people living in poverty in Malawi.] I love the empowerment that gives them the opportunity to spend the money on their community, on their family, on their basic human needs: sending their children to school, putting a roof over their heads. We still have an extremely long way to go, but we are very happy that we have started that process.
You aim to reach 1 billion users. What's the plan to get there?
When we set that as a goal a few years ago it seemed completely ridiculous, but over the years it becomes less ridiculous. To reach a billion internet users, we need about one in five internet users in each country. Now it is one in six internet users in the Philippines, and one in eight internet users in Australia. In Spain that is one in eleven. In the US that is one in twelve. So at 200 million now, we're a fifth of the way to a billion, and if we can keep growing as fast as we've been, hopefully we'll get there.
Any plans for an IPO?
It's certainly something that's on the horizon.
This article first appeared in the January/February 2025 edition of WIRED UK.
