Melanie Perkins

Perkins was born in 1987 in Perth, Western Australia, to an Australian-born mother who worked as a teacher and a Malaysian engineer of Filipino and Sri Lankan heritage. She attended Sacred Heart College, a secondary school located in the northern Perth suburb of Sorrento. While at high school, Perkins trained seriously in figure skating and started a small business selling handmade scarves. After high school, Perkins enrolled at the University of Western Australia, majoring in communications, psychology and commerce. At this time, Perkins was also a private tutor for students learning graphic design. Perkins has said the slow learning curve of traditional design tools prompted her to explore simpler, web-based alternatives. She left university at age 19 to pursue a startup with Cliff Obrecht. == Career ==

Fusion Books In 2007, Perkins and Obrecht founded Fusion Books, which let schools create yearbooks using an online drag-and-drop editor and template library. The business grew in Australia and later operated in New Zealand and France. Canva Perkins and Obrecht began pitching a broader design platform in the early 2010s and met investor Bill Tai during a visit to Perth. Through Google Maps co-creator Lars Rasmussen, who advised the project, they were introduced to former Google designer Cameron Adams, who joined in 2012 and became Canva’s third co-founder and chief product officer. Canva launched publicly in 2013 and has reported periods of profitability as it scaled. == Personal life ==

Perkins and Obrecht married in January 2021 on Rottnest Island. Later that year, they joined the Giving Pledge, committing at least half of their fortune to philanthropic purposes. , the Australian Financial Review assessed Perkins' and Obrecht's joint net worth as 14.14 billion. As of February 2026, Forbes estimated Perkins' net worth at 7.6 billion.. == References ==