Australian startup Canva has announced an additional $3.6 million in funding and new partnerships with website hosts to integrate its quick graphic design tool.
The Sydney-based startup, which counts former Apple luminary Guy Kawasaki as its chief evangelist, has signed agreements with GoDaddy, Tailwind, Agora Pulse, Post Planner and TabSite to integrate Canva into their Web platforms.
Under the partnerships, each company will add Canva “design” buttons next to existing upload options. Users can click the button to quickly design graphics without leaving the website.
Canva is accepting applications from interested third-party websites that wish to add a design button, with the button rolling out over the next few weeks, Canva said.
“Instead of just offering an ‘Upload’ button and expecting users to figure out the rest, the Canva Button enables a website’s users to easily create graphics without leaving their page,” said Canva CEO Melanie Perkins.
“We want this to be accessible to everyone so the button is free and can be implemented with just a few lines of code.”
New Canva investors Founders Fund and Shasta Ventures joined existing investors Matrix Partners, Blackbird Ventures and Square Peg Capital in the funding round.
Canva launched 10 months ago with a service meant to simplify graphic design and now has 600,000 users globally.
While the startup seems to have found its footing, Perkins recently revealed that she initially had great difficulty finding funding.
“Rather than just pitching the investor and all of a sudden having a cheque written, it was years of trying to find investors, trying to get people to understand our vision and the enormity of the problem,” she said.
Adam Bender covers startup and business tech issues for Techworld and is the author of dystopian sci-fi novels We, The Watched and Divided We Fall. Follow him on Twitter: @WatchAdam
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