Canva says no people will lose their jobs as integrating its prize artificial intelligence acquisition, Leonardo.AI, into the design platform, refuting media reports of potential job losses as inaccurate. 

The Australia reported that Canva chief operating officer and cofounder Cliff Obrecht told Leonardo’s 150 North Sydney-based staff in a video call last week that the business was being restructured.

Obrecht reportedly told the Leonardo employees that while many in the Leonardo team would “directly map” to existing AI efforts, others were encouraged to look at other roles in the business.

Canva’s Head of Corporate and Internal Communications Lachlan told Startup Daily that the business is not exploring any redundancies and no job losses were discussed or communicated to the team, saying suggestions otherwise are “categorically false”, taking a swipe at The Australian for failing to check with the company prior to publication. 

“It is disappointing that The Australian did not seek our response before publishing, had they done so, we would have unequivocally clarified the facts,” he said.

“We provided a clear on-the-record statement, which was not included in their reporting.”

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The report came amid heightened sensibilities around AI and tech jobs after US fintech Block announced it was cutting 40% of its workforce, 4000 jobs, and Sydney logistics software platform WiseTech Global announced 2000 coding jobs would go, with both companies citing AI as the reason. 

Doubling down on AI

Canva said the business was accelerating its planned integration of Leonardo “to double down on our AI ambitions” with a small team continuing to work on Leonardo as a standalone product while others join the mother ship as part of 100-plus AI product and research teams.

Leonardo remained a standalone business for the past 18 months since Canva acquired the Sydney generative AI startup in 2024 in a deal worth more than $300 million. Its tech is already integrated into key parts of the Canva product.

“Leonardo has proven itself a global leader in image and video generation, which is foundational to what we’re building at scale for Canva’s 265 million users,” a spokesperson said.

“As part of this phase of the integration, team members across Leonardo will transition into new teams across Canva.

“This is simply about better integrating their world-class talent to work across Canva’s broader suite of AI products at even greater scale. At the same time, we’ll continue investing in Leonardo as a standalone product, with a dedicated team focused on serving and growing its existing community.”

Last week Obrecht also announced Canva was acquiring two more startups, Mango.AI and Cavalry, from the US and UK respectively, as well as adding a “chief algorithms officer” to its C-suite.

Mango.ai is 10-month-old San Francisco marketing algorithm startup that was still in stealth mode. Cavalry is UK-based 2D animation platform used by motion designers.

The acquisitions take the number of companies Canva’s acquired in the last two years to five, following on from Affinity and Leonardo in 2024, and MagicBrief last year.