The former Canva CFO is applying the same financial discipline that helped build a $26 billion technology company to one of sport's most undercapitalised opportunities.
When Damien Singh became owner of Gwalia United FC—formerly Cardiff City Ladies—the move raised a question that has followed him since: what does a technology CFO know about running a football club?
Quite a lot, it turns out. Particularly if the question is how to build an organisation that can sustain itself financially over the long term.
Singh spent eight years as CFO of Canva, during which the company grew from roughly US$10 million in annual revenue to more than US$2 billion while maintaining free cash flow profitability throughout. That financial discipline—rare in hypergrowth technology, rarer still in professional sport—is precisely the lens he is bringing to Gwalia United.
A Structural Opportunity in Women's Football
Women's football is at an inflection point. Attendances are rising, broadcast deals are expanding, and the commercial infrastructure around the women's game is developing in ways that would have seemed implausible a decade ago. But many clubs are still operating without the financial foundations to translate that momentum into long-term sustainability.
Singh sees Gwalia United as a specific opportunity within that broader shift. The club is the only Welsh women's club competing in the English football system, currently positioned two leagues below the Women's Super League—a structure that gives it a clear developmental pathway and commercial differentiation.
"Women's football is still in the early stages of professionalisation, and there is a real opportunity to build clubs differently—with stronger financial discipline, sustainable business models, and a long-term vision," Singh says.
The Same Philosophy, a Different Domain
The parallels with his work in technology investing are not coincidental. Across both sectors, the underlying problem Singh is interested in solving is the same: helping build organisations that are financially sustainable, strategically sound, and designed to endure rather than chase short-term success.
At Canva, that meant maintaining profitability discipline even as the company scaled aggressively. At Gwalia United, it means building commercial foundations and operational systems that give the club the stability to develop players and compete at progressively higher levels.
It also means thinking about culture. Singh's experience scaling teams from 50 to 4,000 people at Canva taught him that the best organisations are built around people who are both highly capable and deeply aligned with the mission. That principle applies as readily to a football squad as it does to a software engineering team.
Applying Technology Thinking to Sport
Singh is also applying lessons from the technology sector to how he thinks about Gwalia United's development. The use of data, the approach to talent identification, the design of commercial partnerships—these are areas where organisations that have traditionally operated by instinct are increasingly finding competitive advantage through more systematic approaches.
"Now operating at the intersection of technology, investing and sport"—Singh's description of where his focus sits—is less a piece of personal branding than an accurate description of a genuinely unusual position. Very few people have the depth of operating experience in high-growth technology that he brings to this conversation, and fewer still are applying it directly to building sports organisations.
The bet is a long one. Building a sustainable women's football club is not a short-term exercise. But neither was helping build Canva. Singh is focused on helping build and support organisations that create enduring value for the people and communities they serve, and Gwalia United is, in that sense, entirely consistent with everything else he is working on.
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