Everyone in Australia’s close-knit tech sector was expecting a big year for Canva. And many still are, but even its biggest backers couldn't have expected this week’s events.
The abrupt departure of former chief financial officer Damien Singh has sent shockwaves through the startup ecosystem. Initially explained as a mutual decision made ahead of a big year for the company, Capital Brief revealed Singh resigned after an internal investigation was launched following anonymous messages on Blind, a workplace discussion app.
The timing is awkward. Canva is right on the brink of a $1.5 billion secondary share sale that will be a bigger liquidity event for the sector than Atlassian’s IPO. It is also widely tipped to IPO itself as soon as next year. While it won’t have much difficulty attracting a quality replacement for Singh, speculation is rife among staff that those plans have been thrown into disarray.
For its part, Canva’s biggest investor Blackbird Ventures is not concerned, at least not outwardly. “Canva has a strong finance function, so we do not expect that the CFO role vacancy will disrupt the day-to-day business operations,” Blackbird partner Rick Baker told Capital Brief in a statement. Baker said he could not comment on Canva’s internal investigation.
