We’re thrilled to announce that Snowflake’s pitch-based global Startup Challenge will be back for its second year. Seven hundred companies from 56 countries participated in the inaugural challenge, and 2022 is poised to be even bigger.
“Due to the huge success of this competition, we’re extremely excited to announce that this year’s competition is going to include a total of $1 million in potential investments by Snowflake Ventures in the winners,” Snowflake Ventures’ Senior Director, Corporate Development, Stefan Williams, said.
The application window just opened, so start polishing your best pitch. To apply, your company must be an early-stage startup (an independent legal entity) with less than $5 million dollars in funding and have not received a Series A or a priced round of funding. You must have built a data app that depends on Snowflake as a core part of the architecture. And you must submit a working application, pitch deck, and demo video by March 1, 2022. Please see the official rules for details.
Snowflake will select 10 semifinalists in April, then narrow the field to three finalists who will get the chance to pitch their business to our esteemed judges and audience at Snowflake Summit 2022 in June.
Submissions will be scored based on:
- The business potential including and how your startup complements Snowflake
- Use of Snowflake as a core component of the architecture including of one or more Snowflake features, such as Snowflake Secure Data Sharing and Snowpark
- Uniqueness of your application and the competitive advantage it delivers
- The leadership team’s experience and ability to execute
The judging panel will include Benoit Dageville, Snowflake’s co-founder; Denise Persson, Snowflake’s CMO; Jayshree Ullal, Arista’s President and CEO; and Carl Eschenbach, Partner at Sequoia Capital. (Note: The judging panel is subject to change. Please refer to the official rules for details.)
Last year’s challenge had an impressive field of high-quality entries and innovative ideas. Want some inspiration? Check out the top three finalists from the 2021 Startup Challenge (which you can read more about here):
- OverlayAnalytics—the 2021 Challenge winner
- Invoke Learning
- Elysium Analytics
“If you’re even remotely on the fence, considering applying, you should 100% do it,” OverlayAnalytics’ co-founder and CEO, Bryan Shupe, said. “It’s an incredible opportunity and amazingly fun to go through it with your teammates, and it really helps you rally around the core themes and values of what your company’s going to become. It forces you to take inventory and go deep into the areas where you know you’ll have a competitive advantage—and then shape that narrative in a way that’s compelling to investors and, ultimately, customers.”
In addition to sharing up to $1 million in potential investments from Snowflake, the top finalists in 2022 will be promoted on Snowflake marketing channels. The 10 semifinalists will also be mentioned on Snowflake’s blog.
For more information or to start your application, click here. We can’t wait to hear about what you’ve been building!