Canva job cuts affect over 1,200 employees as it restructures for AI era
Chief executive officer Melanie Perkins said the restructuring followed the company’s first slowdown in growth in a decade and reflected the need to rethink how it operates and organises its teams.
Australian design platform Canva is implementing a major restructuring that will impact 1,271 employees, or 22% of its workforce. The changes, which include redundancies, role adjustments, and relocation requests, are a response to the company's first decade-long growth slowdown and the need to adapt to rapid technological advancements.
CEO Melanie Perkins described the development as the most challenging moment in Canva's 13-year history, emphasizing the need to rethink how the company operates and structures its teams. The restructuring aims to combine teams, reduce specialization, and eliminate management layers, with Sydney becoming the primary hub for product teams.
Employees will be expected to work in an office two to three days per week, depending on their location. Canva's AI capabilities, including Canva AI 2.0, are driving the need for these changes. The company, founded in 2013 by Perkins, Cliff Obrecht, and Cameron Adams, now has over 25 crore monthly users and is expanding beyond template-based design.
Competitors like Figma and Atlassian are also integrating AI features into their platforms, prompting Canva to reevaluate its strategy.
Written by urgent.news from YourStory's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
