Australia’s fifth-richest woman, who first made money selling spray-on tattoos at a Perth fair, now runs a multinational tech powerhouse worth more than Woodside, Rio Tinto and Woolworths.
Melanie Perkins’ DIY graphic design platform Canva is now valued at more than $48.7 billion, up from its previous valuation of $39 billion in April, making it one of the most valuable companies from Australia.
Perkins, 37, and her co-founder and husband, Cliff Obrecht, 38, each own about 18 percent of the company.
“It’s been an extraordinary year for all of us at Canva as we celebrate remarkable growth and increasing demand for our business,” Obrecht said.
‘We are very excited to be able to empower more than 200 million people in 190 countries with the simplicity, access and power of our product.
“While we are incredibly proud of the progress we have made, we are just getting started and look forward to much more to come.”
Canva’s paying customers increased 38 percent year-over-year to 22 million, while overall active users surpassed 200 million for the first time, following the introduction of generative AI features.
Melanie Perkins’ DIY graphic design platform Canva is now valued at more than $48.7 billion, up from its previous valuation of $39 billion in April, making it one of the most valuable companies from Australia.
He had the idea for a graphic design business in 2005 and launched the precursor to Canva, a school yearbook business called Fusion, from his mother’s living room. Her then-boyfriend Cliff Obrecht was her co-founder (pictured, Melanie and Cliff in 2005)
After humble beginnings, the ultra-ambitious Perkins has come to be regarded in tech circles as a friendly but “intense” visionary who is obsessed with getting everyone using her website.
“We want every person on the planet to use Canva,” he previously said.
He also shared with staff that the company aspires to become one of the most valuable in the world, but they have no intention of keeping all that wealth.
In 2022, they signed up for Bill Gates’ Giving Pledge, pledging to donate the majority of their fortune to charitable causes during their lifetime.
‘We have never felt like it was our money, we have always felt like we are purely its custodians. As we’ve shared before, our intention has long been to give away wealth and we’ve been thinking carefully about the best way to begin that journey,” Perkins wrote in 2021.
“We have a tremendously optimistic belief that there is enough money, good will, and good intentions in the world to solve most of the world’s problems, and we want to spend our lives working to achieve it.”
A recent filing with the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profit Organizations Commission revealed that between July 2022 and December 2023, Canva founders, including Cameron Adams, contributed $38.9 million in cash to the Canva Foundation, along with an additional $607,416 in cash. donations.
The Canva Foundation supports a variety of initiatives in Australia, India, Afghanistan, the Middle East, the Philippines, Ukraine, the United States, and several African nations.
Notable contributions include $700,000 in disaster relief for earthquake recovery efforts in Turkey, Morocco and Afghanistan, as well as support following flooding in Libya and wildfire devastation in Hawaii.
The Foundation has also committed an initial $7.4 million to an educational pilot program focused on improving literacy and numeracy skills in southern Africa and India.
Ms. Perkins is pictured wearing what appears to be the $30 engagement ring her fiancé gave her in Türkiye.
In 2013, the couple jetted to Richard Branson’s luxurious private island, Necker Island, in the British Virgin Islands in the Caribbean (pictured on vacation).
Perkins and Obrecht met while studying at the University of Western Australia and early on made money together selling spray tattoos at local fairs.
Before meeting Mr. Obrecht, Ms. Perkins was a dedicated figure skater and trained daily at 4:30 a.m. before attending Sacred Heart College.
After school, I sold handmade scarves at local markets and stores.
While studying business in college, he earned additional income tutoring other students in graphic design.
Her idea for a graphic design business took shape in 2005, leading her to start a school yearbook business, Fusion, from her mother’s living room.
“My boyfriend became my co-founder and we started in my mom’s living room,” she said.
The couple started with a bank loan and a $5,000 tax refund, which they used to advertise online and send sample yearbooks to the school.
In 2013, they launched Canva and purchased the URL canva.com for $2,500. The following year, they moved to Sydney to expand the business.
Ms. Perkins faced numerous rejections from investors (being rejected 100 times) before perfecting her pitch and securing $1.5 million in funding, including support from Google Maps co-founder Lars Rasmussen.
Obrecht and Perkins have dated for more than a decade and have made billions, but they already signed a commitment to give it away.
The couple travels the world but also lives a modest lifestyle when in Sydney.
In an effort to connect with Silicon Valley’s tech leaders, Ms. Perkins even learned to kiteboard.
However, while sailing alone in the Caribbean channel between Richard Branson’s Necker and Moskito islands, he became stranded for hours and had to be rescued.
One of the couple’s first business strategies was to persuade photographers to accept a 25-cent royalty per image sale in Canva’s library, rather than the flat rate offered by platforms like Getty.
Obrecht convinced them that as Canva grew, their photographs could be sold thousands or even millions of times, generating much larger overall profits.
In 2019, Obrecht proposed on a trip to Türkiye, with an engagement ring valued at just $30.
‘We live quite modestly and don’t really see the need to simply accumulate wealth. “The priority for the company is education, because we really feel that educating disadvantaged people gives them the opportunity to break the cycle,” he said.
The couple married on Rottnest Island in January 2021, but still reside in Sydney and live in a modest terrace house in Surry Hills, bought for $1.7 million, the average price of a home in the inner-city suburb of the city.
“Mel and I are committed to donating all our money to make the world a better place,” he told The Australian.
“I think running such a large company with such a significant valuation now, it’s an obligation for us to use it to be a force for good and make the world a better place, rather than just hoarding shit.”