Canva hires former Zoom CFO Kelly Steckelberg to run finance ahead of expected IPO

Kelly Steckelberg attends as the John Ritter Foundation for Aortic Health hosts an Evening from the Heart LA 2022 Gala at Valley Relics Museum on May 05, 2022 in Van Nuys, California.

Araya Doheny | Getty Images

Canva, a high-valued design software startup that competes with Adobe, said Monday that it hired Kelly Steckelberg as CFO, five years after she helped take Zoom public and then guided the company through its pandemic surge.

Founded in 2013, Canva was valued recently at $32 billion, a drop from its peak of $40 billion in 2021.

“Kelly’s impressive track record as a strong leader and strategic thinker, combined with her proven expertise in scaling enterprise companies, make her the perfect addition to our leadership bench,” Canva said in an emailed statement.

Canva is generating about $2.5 billion in annualized revenue and boasts 220 million monthly users. The company is widely viewed as a top IPO candidate for venture-backed tech companies after a historically slow period for new offerings dating back to early 2022.

On Monday, ServiceTitan, which sells software for the trades, filed to list on the Nasdaq. Cerebras, a maker of artificial intelligence chips, has been on file since late September, and online lender Klarna said last week that it’s confidentially filed its IPO paperwork with the SEC.

A Canva spokesperson declined to comment on the startup’s timeline for an IPO.

Steckelberg held financial positions at Cisco and was CEO of online dating company Zoosk before joining Zoom in 2017. Steckelberg is based in Austin, Texas, while Canva has its headquarters in Sydney, Australia.

Zoom went public with Steckelberg’s help in 2019. The video-chat company saw its market cap soar to over $160 billion in October 2020, early in the Covid pandemic, as users working from home swarmed to the app. Zoom has since lost more than 85% of its value.

Steckelberg announced her departure from Zoom in August after seven years at the company. Last month, former Microsoft executive Michelle Chang replaced Steckelberg as Zoom’s CFO.

Canva’s previous finance chief, Damien Singh, resigned in February after the company said it was conducting an internal investigation surrounding inappropriate behavior.

WATCH: Zoom deserves another look from investors despite its weak growth

Zoom deserves another look from investors despite its weak growth, says MAI Capital's Chris Grisanti