Canva, the $26 Billion Design Startup, Launches a Productivity Suite To Take On Google Docs, Microsoft Office (fortune.com) 20
Canva, the Australian graphic design business valued at $26 billion, is introducing a new suite of digital workplace products that "represent a direct challenge to Google Docs, Microsoft Office, and Adobe, whose digital tools are mainstays of the modern workplace," reports Fortune. However, Cliff Obrecht, Canva co-founder and COO, claims that Canva isn't trying to compete with these corporate behemoths. "Instead, he sees Canva as a visual-first companion to these tools," reports TechCrunch.
"We're not trying to compete head-to-head with Google Docs," Obrecht told TechCrunch. "Our products are inherently visual, so we take a very visual lens on, what does a visual document look like? How do you turn that boring document that's all text based into something engaging?" Fortune reports: With the launch, Canva hopes to transform itself from a mainly consumer-focused brand often used by individual teams to design social media graphics and presentations to a critical business tool -- and, in the process, crack open the productivity management software market valued at $47.3 billion and growing at 13% a year, according to Grand View Research. "Visual communication is becoming an increasingly critical skill for teams of every size across almost every industry," cofounder and CEO Melanie Perkins said in a statement. "We're bringing simple design products to the workplace to empower every employee, at every organization, and on every device." The product offerings include Canva Docs, Canva Websites, Canva Whiteboards and Data Visualization -- all of which are interoperable, "so if you make a presentation, you can turn it into a document or a website too," notes TechCrunch.
"Canva also plans to launch its API in beta, enabling developers to more easily integrate with the worksuite. Plus, Canva is launching a creator program where highly-vetted designers can sell templates, photos and designs to Canva users."
"We're not trying to compete head-to-head with Google Docs," Obrecht told TechCrunch. "Our products are inherently visual, so we take a very visual lens on, what does a visual document look like? How do you turn that boring document that's all text based into something engaging?" Fortune reports: With the launch, Canva hopes to transform itself from a mainly consumer-focused brand often used by individual teams to design social media graphics and presentations to a critical business tool -- and, in the process, crack open the productivity management software market valued at $47.3 billion and growing at 13% a year, according to Grand View Research. "Visual communication is becoming an increasingly critical skill for teams of every size across almost every industry," cofounder and CEO Melanie Perkins said in a statement. "We're bringing simple design products to the workplace to empower every employee, at every organization, and on every device." The product offerings include Canva Docs, Canva Websites, Canva Whiteboards and Data Visualization -- all of which are interoperable, "so if you make a presentation, you can turn it into a document or a website too," notes TechCrunch.
"Canva also plans to launch its API in beta, enabling developers to more easily integrate with the worksuite. Plus, Canva is launching a creator program where highly-vetted designers can sell templates, photos and designs to Canva users."
email and calendar (Score:2)
Without email and integrated calendar they won't be displacing much from Google or Microsoft.
Re: email and calendar (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I can see adding Canva along with O365 or G Workplace. Without a larger feature set they will not pull too many users away from other vendors, just live along side.
Can't wait until they try to turn spreadsheets into 'something more engaging'.
Visually engaging (Score:4, Funny)
How do you turn that boring document that's all text based into something engaging?
Oh no. They made PowerPoint.
Re: (Score:2)
How do you turn that boring document that's all text based into something engaging?
Oh no. They made PowerPoint.
They said "engaging" -- so not PowerPoint. :-)
Re: (Score:2)
Right, with every single possible animation being used.
It's really easy (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Fire all the people who value the look of the document over the content.
Including all the people that came up with Cascading Style Sheets? I mean, should the entire internet be displayed as just monospaced text on an off-white background? Who needs headlines, boldface, italics, or underlines. I can potentially lose drop caps, pull quotes, animated PNGs, and headers and footers without losing much sleep, but I would still like to keep inline pictures.
A good article layout improves readability, as anyone who has used PageMaker, QuarkXpress, FrameMaker, or MS Publisher can atte
So they actually raised $200 million (Score:4, Interesting)
That $26 billion valuation just means that some VC invested $200 million and got only 5% of the company. Since then, that supposed $40 billion valuation has been re-evaluated to now be only $26 billion. That $200 million investment is apparently looking a lot less wise.
$200 million may seem like a lot of money, but considering what they are trying to do, I have doubts that that will be enough money.
Re: (Score:2)
You're off by an order of magnitude there... $40B * 0.05 = $2B, not $200M (so either said VC invested 10x more than that, or only got 0.5% of the company for their money).
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks for fixing my math. This makes the investment even more ridiculously overvalued. What VC with a brain would invest $200 million in a "startup", for 0.5% of an ownership stake? These guys got royally screwed.
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Like you, I think paying $200M for half a percent of a company where the business plan appears to be "We're going to make our own Powerpoint! With blackjack! And hookers!" is wildly nonsensical. I've read on multiple occasions that the fine art market (and, subsequently, NFTs) are just money laundering tools. Maybe that's what happened here?
Jass hands (Score:2)
Are we feeling disruptive today? (Score:3)
I'm going to disrupt the coffee machine during my next coffee break!
If Design is their thing (Score:3)
What a dumb name (Score:2)
Deceptive Slashed Title (Score:1)
The title: Launches a Productivity Suite To Take On Google Docs, Microsoft Office
The quote: We're not trying to compete head-to-head with Google Docs
It is a product that competes with one single product in the other office suites. Good luck on boarding multiple teams, clients and users on a stand alone platform for just an upgraded PowerPoint clone.
surveillance (Score:2)
I was going to argue against any new product like this as probably having deeply built in surveillance tools, but then when the alternatives are Google and Microsoft that seemed like a fairly stupid argument against Canva.
Canva has a browser based PDF editor (Score:2)
This is something I just learned the other and I found it remarkable. I don't think there are many things like it out there. Canva itself is otherwise unremarkable to me but I was blown away when I saw this.