Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – In the past, making graphic designs could only be done by people with qualified skills and high flying hours. The reason is, graphic design applications such as Photoshop, Corel Draw, and so on, are very complicated and difficult for ordinary people to understand.
However, this problem is no longer a significant problem today. This is because a woman from Australia, Melanie Perkins, introduced a graphic design application called Canva in 2013. Initially, it was underestimated because it was believed that it would not be able to compete with existing design applications. However, that view proved wrong. In fact, Canva is the most popular design application and has successfully made a profit of up to 54 T.
What’s the story?
Upset Photoshop is complicated
Melanie Perkins was born in Perth, May 13, 1987. Since childhood, her hobby has been designing and drawing posters. On this basis, during his education from the lowest level to higher education, he made drawing his main subject.
During this profession he did not find it difficult at all when using design applications on the computer. Even if there are difficulties, it is used as a challenge and encouragement. PassionThat’s what made him survive in this profession.
This is of course different from ordinary people who want to grow their passion and learn graphic design. Sometimes, his high spirits are immediately broken when he finds out how difficult it is to draw on the application. And this is what Melanie didn’t see at all. He views design application as very easy, and that other people should be able to do it.
However, Melanie’s views changed in 2006. At that time, she, who was 19 years old, worked part-time as a design tutor for school children. It was while teaching that he began to realize that there are people who cannot use design applications because they are complicated.
In fact, almost none of his students can use Photoshop, Coreldraw, Adobe Stock, and so on. Even if there is something that can be done thanks to repeated teaching and practice. Very tiring.
Moreover, when creating a poster, for example, the process is very complicated and lengthy. Someone has to design and draw it. Then it continues to convert to the desired size, before finally printing.
“From here I have to be able to make the whole process simple,” he said with a sigh, quoted Forbes.
Moving on from this anxiety, Melanie wanted to design a graphic design application that was concise and easy to understand. Luckily, Melanie’s friend, Cliff Obrecht, became a discussion partner about this.
Long story short, the results of the discussion then led to the decision to establish a student yearbook design application, Fusion Books, in 2007. Through this application, students do not need to call vendors to design their yearbooks.
Only through Fusion Books can students arrange their own models in their yearbook. Moreover, the application system has provided various design templates, complete with various emojis, images and animations. So students only need to click on the computer.
Unexpectedly, Fusion Books, which initially only existed in one school, then ‘exploded’ was used by more than 200 partner schools. Even so, this achievement did not make Melanie satisfied. He wanted to create a multifunctional design application. Not only for yearbooks, but also for business cards, poster designs, presentations, and so on.
Wealthy
Unfortunately, efforts to realize the application was not easy. To entrepreneur, Melanie explained that her biggest challenge was the issue of funds. It is difficult for him to get funds from investors. Several times back and forth to meet 100s of investors, Melanie and Obrecht’s ideas could not materialize. Investors view the graphic design business as stuck. It can be forced, then the investor funds given to Melanie will simply evaporate.
Until finally, a glimmer of hope arrived in 2011. In Perth there was a startup competition that brought in investor Bill Tai. Melanie rushed to register and unexpectedly even won. From here he had the opportunity to go to Silicon Valley.
Long story short, it was after leaving the US technology center that she started to receive investments worth US$ 3 million in 2012. Thanks to these funds, Melanie-Obrecht was free to work. Luckily, a former Google employee from Sydney, Cameron Adams, was willing to help both of them.
Adam, who later became the Co-Founder, is said to have helped in the technology development sector. It was from the results of the three discussions that, on January 1, 2013, a graphic design application called Canva was born.
On the company’s official website, Canva strives to make everyone able to design graphics without the need for qualified graphic design skills. In an instant, this application was successfully used by 50,000 users. Then a year later it was used by 600,000 users with 3.5 million designs.
This figure then continued to double in the following years. Canva has finally succeeded in keeping up with the clunky design app. Time even named Canva the most influential company in the world.
Starting from anxiety, then continuing to be underestimated, now CEO and Founder of Canva Melanie Perkins has succeeded in owning assets of US $ 3.6 billion or IDR 54 trillion. With such wealth, Forbes named him the 787th richest person in the world and inducted him into the 30 Under 30 Hall of Fame.
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