A Manchester animation software firm has been acquired by digital media giant Canva.

The Australian-founded firm with more than 265 million users has snapped up Cavalry, a 2D animation platform used by top motion designers.

Cliff Obrecht, co-founder and COO at Canva, said the deal will see it “take another big step toward helping professional designers break free from bloated and expensive tools, bringing everything from vector to motion design into one powerful creative suite”.

Canva has also acquired MangoAI, developer of algorithms and learning loops to power the next generation of its AI-driven marketing products.