A Case Study - Canva’s IP Strategy to Success
Founded in Perth in 2013, the design and visual communication platform, Canva, is now a multinational company with over 125 million monthly users. Central to Canva’s success is its dedication to protecting its rapidly growing IP portfolio.
Canva’s Founders Melanie Perkins and Cliff Obrecht were the inventors of its early patent for a “System for Single-Use Stock Image Design” in 2013. Melanie Perkins also filed the original CANVA trade mark in 2012, later assigning it to the Canva corporate entity. This is usual for most start-ups that are driven by the initial IP created and protected by the founders. The early move to protect this IP placed Canva in a position for a seed capital raise of $3.6m, followed shortly by their first Series A capital raise of $6.0m.
Today, Canva owns at least 78 patents protected in the United States, Australia, the European Union and China. TMView database details that Canva owns 276 registered and pending trade mark applications; 41 in Australia and the rest in the US, UK, the EU and China.
Read the full case study below to learn how Canva used IP to build a multi-billion dollar company.
A Case Example of how Vigilant IP Protection Grew a Multi-Billion dollar company
Canva is a web-based online design and visual communication platform founded in Perth, Australia, in 2013 by Melanie Perkins, Cliff Obrecht, and Cameron Adams. Created with the mission to empower everyone in the world to design anything and publish anywhere, this multinational company has experienced remarkable growth over the last 10 years. With over 125 million people using its product every month, Canva continues to pursue innovation and expand the growth and depth of its product.
Since its inception, part of Canva’s success strategy has been its strong IP portfolio. Canva Pty Ltd filed its first trade mark for the word CANVA in Australia in March 2012 and its first patent in 2013. Since then, Canva has filed several hundred trade mark and patent rights, showing its dedication to protecting its business assets as it continues to innovate and grow.
Summary of patents
According to Espacenet, Canva owns at least 78 patents, most of which are protected in the United States, as well as Australia, the European Union and China.
The founders were the inventors of Canva’s early patents in Australia and these first patents protected:
2013 - A single-use design element licensing system having a licensing server and a design element repository, where each design element in the repository comprises a licensing attribute.
2014 - A multi-user design collaboration system for creating brand capital, where one or more than one computing and one or more than one server is used to present a user interface to one or more than one user
Since 2013, Canva has consistently filed patents around its design platform. These patents focus on specific functions with the Canva platform that improve the user-experience. This is common for software-based patents where the new invention is not for the platform as a whole, but instead is for specific features within the platform.
Canva’s recently filed patents protect systems and methods for prompt-based inpainting, uploading content items, automatically generating a video production, automatically cropping digital images, image rotation and image enhancement (to name a few!)
Summary of trade marks
Canva has been vigilant in protecting its trade mark portfolio by securing trade mark registrations for its core trade mark, logos and new product lines:
Even though Canva filed its first core trade mark in 2012, it continues to expand its portfolio of trade mark rights.
According to the TMView database, Canva Pty Ltd owns 276 trade marks globally; most of which are protected in Australia, the United States, United Kingdom, European Union and China.
Canva has 41 registered and pending trade mark applications in Australia; with 17 new and pending trade marks.
Canva’s has followed a smart trade mark protection strategy delivering both longevity in its trade mark protection rights while protecting its new logos and taglines.
Even though Canva has updated its logos over time, CANVA protected its word mark in standard characters from the beginning giving the brand a sound trade mark registration right.
Canva has protected its logos in black and white and colour. Both of these protections are important:
Black and white protection means that the logos will stand the test of time even if Canva varies its colour scheme – which it has done!
Protecting its blue and blue/purple colour scheme is an important protection of Canva’s trade dress.
Tracking Canva’s IP to its Capital Growth
IP Australia recently quoted Canva as saying:
“It's more important than ever for Canva to have a strong IP portfolio in what is a rapidly evolving industry. So patents are a really important part of protecting all of the innovation that goes on around Canva...” - Kaelah Ford, Head of IP Legal, Canva
Burns IP does not represent Canva Pty Ltd. Information concerning Canva’s IP portfolio and capital raising has been sourced from reliable publicly available resources. However, Burns IP has helped many businesses similar to Canva. If you’re interested in leveraging your IP to achieve growth, open opportunities for partnership or move to an exit strategy, then, get in touch with our team today.