The quiet reinvention of a $42b business, with Canva’s Cameron Adams

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**Cameron Adams** (1:44)
We now have a quarter of a billion people that use Canva every single month. We need to make sure that Canva empowers the whole world in design through everything that we do, and that the AI that we use and develop truly represents the world as well. The real power that we've seen with AI is when you can amplify ideas and when you can take what AI gives you and build on top of it. Put your own stamp on it, make it authentic, and make it connect with the real people that you want to connect with.

**Bob Safian** (2:22)
That's Cameron Adams, chief product officer and co-founder of Canva. I talked with Cam on stage at the Canliance Festival about Canva's dramatic last year as it redefined itself from a design company to an AI company. Cam challenges the idea of the so-called SaaSpocalypse, talks about how product cycles are accelerating, and argues that Canva and its kin help everyday users stay up to speed as technology shifts. He also shares specific steps we can each take to get more impact out of AI, plus the power of exploiting what he calls each organization's unique unfair advantage. It's an idea field romped through technology and creativity, so let's get to it. I'm Bob Safian, and this is Rapid Response.
I'm joined this morning by Cameron Adams, who is the Chief Product Officer and Co-Founder of Canva.
Cam, thanks for doing this, and inviting me to your house this morning.

**Cameron Adams** (3:29)
It is amazing to be chatting with you here in the amazing cabana behind the ducks.

**Bob Safian** (3:34)
I was talking to Cam backstage about the challenge of this year of living dangerously, with AI changing so much, and Canva itself being under a different kind of pressure. Has it been a good year? What's made it a dangerous year?

**Cameron Adams** (3:50)
I'd probably say it's been an interesting year.
And I think we've always been running a marathon at Canva. Like we've always had an incredibly long term vision. This year feels like we're sprinting that marathon just a little bit.

**Bob Safian** (4:03)
You said that you now consider Canva to be an AI company that does design, rather than a design company that does AI. That seems like a big change to make in a company as big as Canva is.

**Cameron Adams** (4:18)
It has been a big change. Having a strong bench of AI researchers and ML engineers has enabled us to rapidly move on the product, and particularly to develop our own unique blend of AI. It's not just repackaging an LLM. It's like deep technical research and unique IP that now exists within the Canva platform. The last year, both the team has scaled up, which has enabled us to ship more. But also, we've entered a new cadence of product shipping.
To me, it feels really exciting because it's almost a return to our startup roots. It's not thinking about 6,000 people and moving them all like the Titanic. It is literally a bunch of speedboats that are now going around and shipping as much customer value as we possibly can on a week-by-week cadence.

**Bob Safian** (5:07)
When you're moving at the pace of AI, I guess your product pace has to be faster than it was. How much do you worry about what that means to your users? If the product changes too fast for them, they're not looking for it to change, they're looking for it to continue to do the things they want it to do. Is all the change behind the scenes or how do you get the customer to be up to speed with you?