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Fil-Aussie becomes youngest billionaire in Australia
Filipino-Australian Melanie Perkins has not just become the youngest billionaire in Australia — she's now also the third richest woman in the country at only 32 years old.
Melanie is the woman behind the graphic design and publishing tool "Canva," which has been widely used across the globe for its user-friendliness and accessibility.
In a press statement, Canva shared that its value surged amid the pandemic, when many shifted to working online. It's even released a few things during lockdown, like snazzy video call backgrounds, to help employees on a work from home setup.
According to Canva, it added another $60 million to its valuation, rocketing to a total of $6 billion in new valuation.
A report on news.com.au said that Canva's business worth is now believed to be at about $2.5 billion, doubling Melanie's wealth and making her the third richest woman in Australia.
The Filipino-Australian found the graphic design solution technology back in 2014 with her fiance, Cliff Obrecht and Cameron Adams.
In a 2019 interview with 60 Minutes Australia that The Philippine Times (Australia) posted on Facebook Wednesday, the Canva CEO shared how she wanted to find an easier way to "create professional and quality graphic designs online no matter your level of experience."
During the interview, Melanie said over 15 million people and 50,000 schools were using Canva on a monthly basis.
Today, its user number has doubled. According to Canva's press statement, the platform is used by over 30 million people a month, "to design around the globe, collaborating on presentations, marketing materials, social media content, videos and more — at a whopping 80 designs per second and a total over 3 billion designs created since launch."
The 60 Minutes Australia interview revealed Melanie's innate entrepreneurial spirit. At 22 years old, she and her partner developed a platform for designing E-books.
According to the same interview, Melanie's big break came after she got the nod of approval from Silicon Valley.
Melanie said the most important thing in building a business is finding a problem you want to solve passionately.
"I think that's the most important thing because once you find a problem you want to solve passionately, there's gonna be so many barriers — every single barrier you can possibly imagine," she said.
"I think that once you get a crystal clear picture of the problem you want to solve, that's sort of step one," she added.
According to the news.com.au article, Melanie debuted on the Australian's richest 250 list at the 82nd spot with a wealth of $1.32 billion.
Fuelled by her passion to see a solution, she's definitely soared high up. — LA, GMA News
