Snowflake Inc. is a

cloud computing Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage ( cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over mul ...

–based data cloud company based in

Bozeman, Montana Bozeman is a city and the county seat of Gallatin County, Montana, United States. Located in southwest Montana, the 2020 census put Bozeman's population at 53,293, making it the fourth-largest city in Montana. It is the principal city of th ...

. It was founded in July 2012 and was publicly launched in October 2014 after two years in

stealth mode In business, stealth mode is a company's temporary state of secretiveness, usually undertaken to avoid alerting competitors to a pending product launch or another business initiative. When an entire company is in stealth mode it may attempt to ...

. The firm offers a cloud-based data storage and analytics service, generally termed "data-as-a-service". It allows corporate users to store and analyze data using cloud-based hardware and software. Snowflake services main features are separation of storage and compute, on-the-fly scalable compute, data sharing, data cloning, and third-party tools support in order to handle the demanding needs of growing enterprises. It runs on

Amazon S3 Amazon S3 or Amazon Simple Storage Service is a service offered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) that provides object storage through a web service interface. Amazon S3 uses the same scalable storage infrastructure that Amazon.com uses to run its e- ...

since 2014, on

Microsoft Azure Microsoft Azure, often referred to as Azure ( , ), is a cloud computing platform operated by Microsoft for application management via around the world-distributed data centers. Microsoft Azure has multiple capabilities such as software as a ...

since 2018 and on the

Google Cloud Platform Google Cloud Platform (GCP), offered by Google, is a suite of cloud computing services that runs on the same infrastructure that Google uses internally for its end-user products, such as Google Search, Gmail, Google Drive, and YouTube. Alongside ...

since 2019. The company was ranked first on the ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...

'' Cloud 100 in 2019. The company's

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

raised $3.4 billion, one of the largest software IPOs in history.

History

Snowflake Inc. was founded in July 2012 in

San Mateo, California San Mateo ( ; ) is a city in San Mateo County, California, on the San Francisco Peninsula. About 20 miles (32 km) south of San Francisco, the city borders Burlingame to the north, Hillsborough to the west, San Francisco Bay and Foster C ...

by three data warehousing experts: Benoît Dageville, Thierry Cruanes and Marcin Żukowski. Dageville and Cruanes previously worked as data architects at

Oracle Corporation Oracle Corporation is an American multinational computer technology corporation headquartered in Austin, Texas. In 2020, Oracle was the third-largest software company in the world by revenue and market capitalization. The company sells da ...

; Żukowski was a co-founder of the Dutch start-up

Vectorwise Actian Vector (formerly known as VectorWise) is an SQL relational database management system designed for high performance in analytical database applications. It published record breaking results on the Transaction Processing Performance Counc ...

. The company's first CEO was Mike Speiser, a venture capitalist at

Sutter Hill Ventures Sutter Hill Ventures is an American private equity firm focused on venture capital investments in technology-based start-up companies. Founded in 1964, Sutter Hill is one of the oldest venture capital firms still in operation. Based in Palo Alto ...

. In June 2014, the company appointed former

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...

executive

Bob Muglia Bob Muglia (born 1959) is an American business executive and research and development specialist. He was formerly the Chief Executive Officer of Snowflake Computing, a data warehousing startup. Muglia is known for managing divisions at Microsoft ...

as CEO. In October 2014, it raised $26 million and came out of stealth mode, being used by 80 organizations. In June 2015, the company raised an additional $45 million and launched its first product, its cloud data warehouse, to the public. It raised another $100 million in April 2017. In January 2018, the company announced a $263 million financing round at a $1.5 billion valuation, making it a

unicorn The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since antiquity as a beast with a single large, pointed, spiraling horn projecting from its forehead. In European literature and art, the unicorn has for the last thousand years o ...

. In October 2018, it raised another $450 million in a round led by

Sequoia Capital Sequoia Capital is an American venture capital firm. The firm is headquartered in Menlo Park, California, and specializes in seed stage, early stage, and growth stage investments in private companies across technology sectors. , Sequoia's total a ...

, raising its valuation to $3.5 billion. In May 2019, Frank Slootman, the retired former CEO of

ServiceNow ServiceNow is an American software company based in Santa Clara, California that develops a cloud computing platform to help companies manage digital workflows for enterprise operations. Founded in 2003 by Fred Luddy, ServiceNow is listed on the ...

, joined Snowflake as its CEO and Michael Scarpelli, the former CFO of

joined the company as CFO. In June 2019, the company launched Snowflake Data Exchange. In September 2019, it was ranked first on

LinkedIn LinkedIn () is an American business and employment-oriented online service that operates via websites and mobile apps. Launched on May 5, 2003, the platform is primarily used for professional networking and career development, and allows job se ...

's 2019 U.S. list of Top Startups. On February 7, 2020, the company raised another $479 million. At that time, it had 3,400 active customers. On September 16, 2020, Snowflake became a

public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange (l ...

via an

(IPO) raising $3.4 billion, one of the largest software IPOs and the largest to double on its first day of trading. On May 26, 2021, the company announced that it would become headquarterless, with a principal executive office located in Bozeman, Montana. On October 17, 2022, the company announced an investment in advanced TV advertising firm OpenAP.

References

External links

* * {{authority control Data warehousing products Cloud databases Cloud computing providers Big data products Big data companies Information technology companies of the United States Computer companies established in 2012 American companies established in 2012 2012 establishments in California 2020 initial public offerings Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange