Melanie Perkins, 32, the founder of a tech startup valued over billion dollars, has received generous backing from renowned investors like Google Maps’ Lars Rasmussen and Ken Goldman from Yahoo. She now leads a team of over 650 employees spanned across three offices – Sydney, Manila, and Beijing.
This is a wake-up call for women when months of lockdown could crush down big dreams and more so, in countries where women are simply not allowed to think big. Today, women are apparently grabbing their rightful place in the global business landscape, not shying away from staking their claim from the ground up. Take it from Melanie.
Melanie Perkins shows why it’s important to go after your dreams
This Filipino-Australian entrepreneur is an influencer who has shown the world that it is never really too early, or too late, to pursue that business idea and finally get it off the ground. Melanie Perkins, the CEO, and co-founder of a graphic design company, Canva, was only 19 when she spotted a potential market gap among students who struggled to design their own yearbooks and decided to take that big leap of faith.
Thus, Melanie Perkins started her own company called Fusion Books, a digital publishing company that enables students to come together through one shared platform and design their own school yearbooks. As contained as it might be, the visionary idea gained international exposure and phenomenal success in Australia.
Using technology more broadly from Fusion Books, she co-founded Canva with her fiance in 2012. Today, the firm has a solid user base of 15 million people. People regularly Canva all over the globe to compose and mass-produce everything, from business cards, invitations to churning out impactful social media posts and profiles.
Spotting opportunity in the crisis-ridden market
Following the latest funding round led by Blackbird and Sequoia China, Canva is now valued over $6 billion, almost doubling its estimated value in 2019. The firm spotted an opportunity in disguise when the raging pandemic brought the entire world to its knees, imposing harsh quarantine and travel restrictions.
The demand for design and creation of professional templates surged by 50 percent in the last three months, and today, more than 80 percent of Fortune 500 companies deploy it to further their branding. Not only that, even small-scale businesses, with no other ways to reach out to their niche, started using Canva for their everyday needs and keep their businesses operating from homes.
Needless to add, the exponential rise in demand had Melanie Perkins make a fortune with finances doubling and making her the third wealthiest woman in Australia. It also resulted in Canva becoming Australia’s most thriving entrepreneurial venture and the world’s most popular digital design platforms.
Believe in your idea and go for it
So, what makes Melanie Perkins connect with her audience besides making an astronomically successful career for herself? For a start, the young entrepreneur believed in remaining true to herself and her idea and finding her own voice to rise above the stereotypical misconceptions regarding women.
If you spot a problem in your society that you’re yearning to solve, then you have a potential business idea already, and that’s your half battle won. There will be hurdles along the way, people trying to put you down and belittling your concept, but if you have a clear picture of the kind of problem it will solve, you are on the right path.
In truth, the journey of any prospering business starts from just one tiny seed – an idea that can change people’s lives. And while there is no magic formula that guarantees an effortless launch from the confinement of a cubicle into becoming your own boss, Melanie Perkins believes that a lot depends on how well the corporations, governments, venture capitalists, and entrepreneurs work together to achieve one common goal.
Entrepreneurship runs in my blood. Wherever I see a problem, I think of a solution. But a lot needs to be done on the collaboration front to keep startups scene thriving and buzzing. Ultimately, we all want a better world. And entrepreneurship plays a vital role in the long term improvement of humanity.
See where you fit in during these extraordinary times for technology and blockchain utilization tandem. Sensing the urgency of the pandemic times, let’s take a hint from this profound thought:
Some people live in 20 years a billion times more than most people live in 80.
― Saint of The Sapiens
Featured Image by Flickr
