Do you know Mélanie Perkins? If that name doesn’t mean anything to you, you definitely know the company she founded. Indeed, the latter is at the origin of one of the greatest success stories in Tech. Mélanie Perkins is the founder of the world-famous creative site, Canva. This 36-year-old Australian has become, over the years, the main competitor of the market leader, Adobe. Business Cool presents its journey to you.
Today, Canva has more than 135 million monthly users and more than 200 new creations generated every second. This company’s growth continues to accelerate, with over 45 million new monthly users over the past 12 months.
The journey of Mélanie Perkins
Melanie Perkins was born on May 13, 1988 in Perth, Australia. She comes from the union of a teacher of Australian origin and a Malaysian engineer of Filipino and Sri Lankan origin. Mélanie Perkins was born with an entrepreneurial soul. As proof, then aged only 15, the young teenager created handmade scarves which she would sell in stores and markets in her neighborhood. Subsequently, Mélanie Perkins embarked on studies that were quite classic for an entrepreneur: business studies. Thus, she began a bachelor’s degree at the University of Western Australia, which she obtained at the end of 2005.
The beginnings of Canva
It all started in 2007, when Mélanie Perkins met a man at her university in Western Australia, a man named Cliff Obrecht. This man doesn’t know it yet, but a few years later he will become the co-founder of one of the biggest tech companies and the husband of Mélanie Perkins. But how did we get there?
During her studies, Mélanie Perkins occasionally gave a few design lessons to students in difficulty. Volunteering, the latter helps her classmates with software from the Adobe suite such as Photoshop. This is how the young student notices that these tools are not easy to use, especially for a beginner. And for good reason, in addition to being fragmented, each of them has its own functionalities. Mélanie Perkins began to dream of a tool accessible to everyone.
So she and her boyfriend created Fusion Books, a beta version of the future Canva. Fusion Books is software designed exclusively for students, a graphic design platform for online school directories. Thus, the Perkins family living room became the company’s office in a few months. Less expensive and more accessible, Fusion Books has become, in just five years, the largest platform in Australia. It then became a reference and was even exported to New Zealand and France.
Mélanie Perkins will explain in Les Echos : “From the start we have had this rather special link with France. And to think that this is only due to the fact that we had an expatriate in our teams from the start… who has remained by our side today, it’s crazy! »
But the young entrepreneur doesn’t intend to stop there… In 2010, sure of her idea, she and her husband drew the first outlines of Canva. The two lovers tried their luck in Silicon Valley, but, for 3 years, the Canva project was systematically rejected by more than 100 venture capitalists. The reasons for these refusals are multiple: lack of relationships, a company based in Australia, little technical background. Things become even more complicated as the young woman dropped out of her studies to devote herself entirely to her project.
The arrival of an investor: pivotal story Canva
With patience and perseverance, the work ends up paying off. In 2012, Lars Rasmussen, co-founder of Google Maps, became their technical advisor. A year later, Canva finally convinced investors, notably Cameron Adams, a former Google executive. The trio finally formed, the first funds raised arrived quickly, the strategy to develop Canva was quickly put in place… And success was achieved. In 2013, Canva brought together nearly 600,000 users and has more than 3.5 million creations online.
Today, the numbers have exploded, the company’s value is estimated at $3.6 billion. Canva boasts more than ten fundraising rounds totaling more than $560 million. The company employs more than 3,500 people around the world.
How rich is Mélanie Perkins, CEO of Canva?
In 2020, the magazine Forbes names Melanie Perkins among Australia’s richest people. It thus appears for the first time on “The Australian Financial Review” list. In fact, his personal fortune is estimated at more than 3.6 billion dollars. Entrepreneur and billionaire, Mélanie Perkins is today one of the rare women to run such a company.
Mélanie Perkins and philanthropy
Mélanie Perkins is now one of the richest women in our world. But she doesn’t forget her roots. Today, Canva has committed to transferring more than 30% of its funds to its foundation and thus making the premium version of Canva available free of charge to more than 400,000 NGOs and associations.
“ We never had the impression that this money belonged to us, but rather that we were simple guardians of it “, Melanie Perkins recently said.
