Canva acquires Leonardo AI to boost image generation capabilities

Canva’s strategic acquisition of Leonardo AI marks a significant expansion in the AI image generation space, with potential implications for creative professionals and the broader AI art community. The Australian design giant continues to build its AI capabilities through acquisitions, enhancing its competitive position against other creative platforms while maintaining Leonardo’s independent operations.

The big picture: Canva is integrating Leonardo AI’s Phoenix foundational model into its Magic Media tool to enhance AI image and video generation capabilities for its 170 million global users.

Key details: Leonardo AI will continue operating independently after the acquisition, with Canva promising that user content won’t be shared with Leonardo unless users explicitly opt in.

• Canva’s chief product officer Cameron Adams described the partnership as set to “unlock new levels of creativity and design in the generative AI space.”
• This represents Canva’s second acquisition of 2024, following its purchase of creative design platform Affinity in March.

About the acquisition target: Leonardo AI is an Australian startup specializing in high-quality image and video generation through advanced foundation models.

• The company’s Phoenix model can generate content faster than competing multimodal models, with capabilities for creating images that closely match text prompts.
• Leonardo AI has demonstrated particular strength in generating clear text within images, addressing a common challenge in AI image generation.
• The startup had raised approximately $40 million in funding prior to the acquisition.

Why this matters: Canva has been strategically expanding its AI toolkit over the past year, positioning itself at the intersection of accessible design and generative AI technology.

• The company was among the first to offer image generation plugins for ChatGPT, showing its commitment to integrating with broader AI ecosystems.
• By acquiring specialized AI companies rather than just building internally, Canva is accelerating its capability development while bringing established AI talent into its organization.