Canva Acquires Leonardo AI: A Strategic Move in the Generative AI Space

Canva Acquires Generative AI Platform Leonardo, Continuing its Expansion

The web-based design platform Canva, a competitor to Adobe, has announced it is buying generative AI company Leonardo. Canva has been beefing up its offerings in recent times with March's acquisition of Affinity Photo, Designer, and Publisher putting it in the photo editing space. Leonardo has user-customizable AI image generators and AI video generators as well as offering AI photo tools such as upscalers and a PNG generator. Company co-founder Cameron Adams says Leonardo AI will "continue to develop its web platform" as a separate product offering, the same deal as Affinity. The Verge reports that Leonardo AI's technology and Phoenix foundation model will be "rapidly" integrated into Canva's existing suite of Magic Studio products, such as the Magic Media image and video generator. All employees, including exectuives, are moving over to Canva. "We're incredibly excited to welcome generative AI company Leonardo.Ai⁠ to the Canva family, as we work towards building the world's leading design AI technology," Canva says in a press release. "With Leonardo.Ai's incredible foundational model, and team of 120 high-caliber researchers, engineers, and designers, this acquisition bolsters our ability to supercharge our growing suite of AI products while investing in continued research and innovation to unlock the future of visual AI." Leonardo AI is a generative AI platform and when asked by TechCrunch what training data the company uses a spokesperson gave a vague response saying the models are trained on "licensed, synthetic and publicly available/open source data." Canva CEO Melanie Perkins has explicitly stated that the design world needs more alternatives to Adobe, which is part of the reason why her company purchased Serif Affinity and continues to add apps. "In the design market, there hasn't been a strong challenger for a long time. It has been a little bit of a one-horse race, and I don't think that works out well for anyone or certainly not well for the consumers or the designers specifically," she said on The Verge podcast. "I think that being able to have another alternative in the market for professional designers benefits everyone." The financial details of Canva's acquisition of Leonardo are yet to be disclosed.

Canva acquires Leonardo.ai to boost its generative AI efforts

Canva has acquired Leonardo.ai, a generative AI content and research startup, as the company looks to deepen its investments in its AI tech stack. The financial terms of the deal weren't disclosed, but Canva co-founder and chief product officer Cameron Adams said it's a mix of cash and stock. All of Leonardo.ai's 120 employees will be joining Canva, including the executive team. "Leonardo will continue to run independently of Canva with a focus on rapid innovation, research and development, now backed by Canva's resources," Adams told TechCrunch. "We'll keep offering all of Leonardo's existing tools and solutions. This acquisition aims to help Leonardo develop its platform and deepen their user growth with our investment, including by expanding their API business and investing in foundational model R&D." Sydney-based Leonardo.ai, which was founded in 2022, was originally meant to focus on video game asset creation. (The startup's founders met while working at a video game company.) But then Leonardo.ai's team decided to build out the platform to meet more scenarios, like creating and training AI models for image creation across industries such as fashion, advertising and architecture. Today, Leonardo.ai offers collaboration tools and a private cloud for models including video generators, as well as access to APIs that let customers build their own tech infrastructure on top of Leonardo.ai's platform. Leonardo.ai differentiates from other generative AI art platforms by the amount of control that it gives users, co-founders Jachin Bhasme, J.J. Fiasson and Chris Gillis told TechCrunch in an interview last December. For example, Leonardo.ai's Live Canvas feature enables users to enter a text prompt and then make a quick sketch of what they want the end result to look like. As the user sketches, Leonardo.ai creates a photorealistic image based on both text and sketch prompts in real time. Unclear is how Leonardo.ai trains its in-house generative models like its flagship model Phoenix, an important question to ask about any generative AI service given the legal ramifications of training models on copyrighted content sans permission. We've reached out to clarify, and will update this post if and when we hear back. Canva itself has been relatively supportive of creators in adopting generative AI, committing $200 million over the next several years to pay out creators who consent to having their content used to train the company's AI models. Massive growth Leonardo.ai has over 19 million registered users, and its tools have been used to create more than a billion images. Adams says that Leonardo.ai, which managed to raise over $38.8 million in capital from backers including Smash Capital, Blackbird, Side Stage Ventures, TIRTA Ventures, Gaorong Capital and Samsung Next prior to the acquisition, will help contribute to Canva's Magic Studio generative AI suite. "We'll look to integrate Leonardo's technology into Magic Studio, which we're very excited about," Adams said. "This might include making existing Magic Studio tools more powerful, or introducing new generative AI capabilities powered by Leonardo's models directly in Canva. It's early days, and we'll be coming together right away to determine how this looks, but we're excited to expand what our users are able to do with AI on Canva." Canva has been investing in generative AI tools since December 2022, beginning with the copywriting assistant Magic Write. But -- eyeing an IPO -- it's ramped up its development efforts in recent months through both internal projects and acquisitions. In February 2021, Canva acquired Kaleido, makers of a drag-and-drop background removal service for images and video. Adams says that Kaleido laid the foundation for much of Canva's more recent generative AI efforts. Leonardo.ai is Canva's eighth acquisition overall and its second acquisition of the year, coming three months after it bought U.K. design company Affinity for an estimated $380 million. Canva also owns presentations startup Zeetings, free stock photography sites Pixabay and Pexels and Czech-based product mockup app Smartmockups. Canva, which was founded in 2012, has raised more than $560 million (most recently at a $26 billion valuation), is pulling in close to $2 billion in revenue and boasts over 180 million monthly users worldwide. "It's a significant but natural next step in our efforts to build the most powerful, all-in-one visual AI offering," Adams said. "We've placed a strong focus on building an AI-powered workflow that includes generative solutions like image and design generation. Pairing that Canva workflow with new generative capabilities will help us continue to set our AI offering apart, and deliver new possibilities for the growing base of teams and enterprises using Canva."

Why Canva Acquired Leonardo.Ai

Leonardo.Ai boasts over 19 million registered users and has facilitated the creation of more than a billion images. In a strategic move to bolster its generative AI capabilities, Canva has acquired Leonardo.Ai, a startup renowned for its generative AI content and research. Canva co-founder and chief product officer Cameron Adams has said that all 120 employees of Leonardo.ai, including the executive team, will join Canva. The acquisition is said to be a mix of cash and stock. Leonardo.Ai, co-founded by Jachin Bhasme, JJ Fiasson, and Chris Gillis in Sydney in 2022, initially focused on creating video game assets. Over time, the company expanded its platform to cater to diverse industries such as fashion, advertising, and architecture by developing AI models for image creation. Some people call it the biggest competitor to Midjourney. The company had previously raised over $38.8 million from several backers such as Smash Capital, Blackbird, Side Stage Ventures, Gaorong Capita, Samsung Next, and TIRTA Ventures. Today, Leonardo.Ai boasts over 19 million registered users and has facilitated the creation of more than a billion images. It provides collaboration tools and a private cloud for various models, including video generators. It also offers API access, enabling customers to develop their own technological infrastructure using Leonardo.Ai's platform. Despite the acquisition, Leonardo.Ai will continue to operate independently, prioritising rapid innovation and research, now backed by Canva's resources. "We'll keep offering all of Leonardo's existing tools and solutions. This acquisition aims to help Leonardo develop its platform and deepen its user growth with our investment. This includes expanding their API business and investing in foundational model R&D," said Adams. Leonardo.Ai sets itself apart from other generative AI art platforms by providing extensive user control. Features on Live Canvas allow users to input text prompts and make quick sketches, generating photorealistic images in real-time. However, the methods Leonardo.Ai uses to train its in-house generative models, such as the flagship Phoenix model, remain unclear. This can be challenging for Canva to figure out later. Canva has been a strong supporter of creators in the generative AI space. The company paid $200 million to compensate creators who allowed their content to be used for training AI models. The acquisition of Leonardo.ai will contribute to Canva's Magic Studio generative AI suite, enhancing existing tools and introducing new capabilities. "Magic Studio works on internally-developed AI and ML algorithms that leverage a combination of foundational AI models from our team, including Kaleido, and a variety of partners like OpenAI, Google, AWS, and Runway," Danny Wu, the head of AI products at Canva, told AIM in a conversation earlier this year. Adams expressed excitement about integrating Leonardo's technology into Magic Studio. "We're eager to expand what our users can achieve with AI on Canva," he said. Canva has been ramping up its AI development efforts, highlighted by previous acquisitions such as Kaleido in 2021, which laid the groundwork for many of Canva's recent AI advancements, which is also looking for an IPO soon. Leonardo.ai is Canva's eighth acquisition overall and its second this year, following the $380 million acquisition of UK-based design company Affinity. Canva's robust portfolio includes presentations startup Zeetings, stock photography sites Pixabay and Pexels, and product mockup app Smartmockups. "We've placed a strong focus on building an AI-powered workflow that includes generative solutions like image and design generation," said Adams. He added that new generative capabilities will help the company set its AI offerings apart. Meanwhile, competitors such as Figma and Adobe are also making strides in generative AI. Just last month, Figma introduced Figma AI, a suite of AI-powered features to enhance designers' creativity and productivity. Adobe has also diversified its portfolio into a generative AI-powered enterprise software platform, introducing Firefly to Photoshop and launched features like Generative Fill and Generative Remove for advanced image editing. The updates follow Adobe's failed 20 billion dollar acquisition of Figma due to antitrust scrutiny last year. Now, taking matters into its own hands, the company is reinventing itself with AI. With AI products in the pipeline and a redesigned interface, Figma is gearing up to compete with major players like Adobe and Canva.

Canva continues spending spree by buying one of our favorite AI image generators

Canva has done it again. Months after confirming the purchase of the Affinity graphic design suite, the Australian company has announced the acquisition of one of the best AI image generators we've reviewed, Leonardo.ai. "Much Like Affinity, Leonardo.ai will continue to develop its web platform for its millions of users - including its business customers", with financial support from Canva, the company stated. This latest buy-out is just the latest in a series of moves made by Canva as it attempts to corner the European market and compete with Adobe's domination of the creative software field. Canva has already imbued its platform with a raft of AI tools, including AI writer Magic Write, and an existing AI art generator. So, what can users expect from the new partnership? In a press release, the company confirmed plans to help grow the Leonardo.ai platform, while integrating its technology and Phoenix foundational model into Canva's existing suite of tools. Expect further investment in this technology and a bigger push into the enterprise space - an area Canva has been keenly courting for some time. And hardcore fans of the genAI service will be pleased to learn that, like Affinity, Canva stated that "Leonardo will continue to operate independently and focus on rapid innovation, model research, and product development." In our recent Leonardo.ai review, we noted that while it wasn't perfect, with some UI decisions feeling clunky, overall, it impressed us - it's a feature-rich tool that delivered quality AI image generation fast. As such, we're excited to see how both platforms advance - especially since Canva boasts one of the best user interfaces we've experienced. However, some are already pointing out that exactly what data Leonardo's Phoenix foundational model is trained on remains elusive. We can only hope Canva took note of Adobe's controversial Terms of Service update a few months ago, which led to a furious backlash from users fearful the creative software giant was using user-generated content to train its Firefly model.

Canva adds a new generative AI platform to its growing creative empire

Here's an example image that Canva says was generated using a Leonardo.ai model. Canva has made efforts to diversify its platform with more office suite-like tools of late, but the visual design and communications platform remains one of the biggest competitors to Adobe's lineup of creative software products. Where the Affinity acquisition may help Canva to compete against Adobe software like Illustrator, Photoshop, and InDesign, Leonardo.ai could be similarly poised as an alternative to Adobe's Firefly generative AI models.