Snowflake is announcing new product capabilities that are changing how developers build, deliver, distribute and operate their applications. These new features include programming language and hardware flexibility from Snowpark Container Services, as well as the ability to build, distribute and monetize full-stack apps with the Snowflake Native App Framework; the ability to leverage transactional and analytical data together with Hybrid Tables; and DevOps capabilities including database change management capabilities, Git integration, Snowflake CLI and Event Tables.

These features collectively help developers build more quickly within a unified platform, distribute products globally, deliver them securely, and scale without operational burden.

We're also excited to announce the Powered by Snowflake Funding Program, which intends to invest up to $100 million dollars toward the next generation of early stage startups building Snowflake Native Apps. The Powered by Snowflake Funding Program features leading venture capital firms Altimeter Capital, Amplify Partners, Anthos Capital, Coatue, ICONIQ Growth, IVP, Madrona, Menlo Ventures, Redpoint Ventures, and Snowflake Ventures. As part of the Powered by Snowflake Funding Program, Amazon Web Services (AWS) will further fuel growth and innovation by providing up to $1M in free Snowflake credits on AWS over four years to startups building Snowflake Native Apps.

Let’s dive in!

Snowpark Container Services, public preview soon in select AWS regions, makes it easy for developers to deploy, manage and scale containerized workloads – all with Snowflake’s secure and fully managed infrastructure. Developers can run any component of their application – whether ML training, a ReactJS front end, a large language model, or an API – without needing to move data or manage complex container-based infrastructure. 

This not only streamlines architecture, but also simplifies operational burden because developers do not need to manage container registries, container management services, compute services, observability tools, security management and network management separately. Snowpark Container Services provides an integrated image registry, elastic compute infrastructure, and RBAC-enabled, fully managed Kubernetes-based clusters with Snowflake’s networking and security controls. 

Snowpark Container Services is designed for security, with both cluster and compute pool isolation. Snowflake automatically spins up a private Kubernetes cluster for each account and employs various techniques to isolate individual customer clusters from one another at the network level. Because each compute pool is completely isolated from other compute pools and the traffic has to go through a private control plane in the customer account where it can be monitored, developers can isolate different workloads even within the same account. 

Snowpark Container Services also provides secure ingress and egress. Ingress requires users to log in using Snowflake authentication, whether programmatically or through a browser. Egress requires the admin to approve the domains or IPs where the traffic or data is permitted. 

Snowflake provides out-of-the-box logging capabilities using the Event Tables (generally available) for logs, as well as interactive logs with tailing options using Snowflake CLI. Developers also have the option to enable the OpenTelemetry agent that scrapes metrics and pushes the data to the tool of their choice. 

To streamline the developer experience of pushing images to Snowflake Image Registry, Snowflake has integrated its registry with popular registries like Docker and Elastic Container Registry, enabling users to copy images directly from these registries securely and easily. 

The exposure management company Tenable is developing new features with Snowpark Container Services to harness generative AI for preventative security. These new features include the ability for cybersecurity teams to use natural language to query data for faster discovery, analysis and action to reduce risk across evolving attack surfaces. With Snowpark Container Services, Tenable can run their language models within Snowflake’s security and governance boundary, eliminating movement of customer data outside of Snowflake. 

Join us at BUILD for a deep dive into Tenable’s use of Snowpark Container Services and to see Snowpark Container Services in action.  

The Snowflake Native App Framework, generally available soon on AWS and public preview soon on Azure, enables developers to package their apps, distribute and monetize them on the Snowflake Marketplace, and run them within the consumer’s Snowflake account. Apps undergo security scans to detect threats prior to being approved for the Marketplace. Snowflake Native Apps available on Snowflake Marketplace today range in use case from connectors to clean rooms to ERP insights.

To make it easier to build Snowflake Native Connectors, Snowflake announced the private preview of the Snowflake Native SDK for Connectors, which provides core library support, templates and documentation. If you’re interested in joining the private preview, sign up here. 

With Snowpark Container Services as part of Snowflake Native Apps (integration in private preview), developers can bring in existing containerized workloads, for an accelerated development cycle, or write app code in the language of their choice and package it as a container. 

As Snowflake Native Apps, these apps undergo security scans and run fully within the consumer’s Snowflake account. The consumer controls what data can be accessed by the app, including logs and metrics. This unique protection of both the provider’s code and the consumer’s data enables providers to securely deliver their apps and consumers to securely use them. 

Let’s take a look at a few examples of Snowflake Native Apps that utilize Snowpark Container Services: 

• Carto: Carto, a geospatial platform, can be deployed entirely inside Snowflake to tackle problems like vehicle routing without requiring data movement. Check out the demo.
• Hex: Hex, a platform for collaborative analytics and data science, can soon be deployed entirely within the end-consumer’s account. Check out the demo and sign up for the waitlist.
• H2O.ai: H2O.ai enables data science teams to train, deploy and score models – all within their Snowflake account. Check out the demo.
• Reka: Reka enables the development of multi-modal proprietary LLMs for both inference and fine-tuning. Check out the demo.
• RelationalAI: RelationalAI, an AI coprocessor built on a relational knowledge graph system, can be deployed in Snowflake to unlock graph analytics capabilities on your Snowflake data. Check out the demo.
• Lamini: Lamini, the enterprise platform for building and fine-tuning private LLMs, can be deployed inside Snowflake. It allows LLMs to be personalized for each customer and user without any data leakage. Check out the demo and sign up for the waitlist.

To get started building Snowflake Native Apps, explore the documentation, try out the Quickstart, or take the Snowflake Native App Bootcamp.  

Snowflake is simplifying application development by bringing Hybrid Tables, private preview, to hundreds of customers. Hybrid Tables are a new table type that offer sub-second single-row operations. This allows Snowflake customers to support transactional workloads on Snowflake, while reducing the need to operate and synchronize across multiple databases accelerating application development.

Developers can query Hybrid Tables with the syntax they are used to in Snowflake. Hybrid Tables enforces primary keys and referential integrity constraints, and provides secondary indexes for accelerated lookups. In addition, Snowflake’s governance capabilities like masking and row-based access policies work out of the box. 

With current performance achieving double-digit millisecond latency and thousands of queries per second (QPS) throughput, customers including Siemens AG, IQVIA, and William Hill are using Hybrid Tables to store application state and serve data. For example, William Hill achieved a 5x increase in performance for their Remote Customer Interaction Platform by leveraging Hybrid Tables for data serving millions of queries per day with low latency, all embedded in the core login flow of their main web and mobile applications. Siemens AG uses Hybrid Tables to store the state of their data ingestion workflow for ERP data. Hybrid Tables’ row locking handles the concurrency needed for thousands of workers to be able to update a centralized state table without bottlenecks.

This is only the start. We’re continuing to accelerate latency and throughput to support more use cases, all within Snowflake. Stay tuned!

We’ve launched capabilities to automate key DevOps processes across your application lifecycle. These features include: 

• Database change management capabilities: Developers can declaratively manage Snowflake objects by automatic provisioning and updating them across different environments. They act as the source of truth for object creation across the dev/test/staging/prod environments in a consistent way using the common “configuration as code” pattern in DevOps. Features include the ability to create or alter a table declaratively; to execute a SQL script directly from a file (such as in a Git repository), VS code or Snowflake Native App (generally available soon); and  to templatize those scripts (private preview).
• Git integration with Snowflake (private preview): Developers will be able to easily view, run, edit and collaborate with artifacts that exist in a git repository and maintain a source of truth.
• Snowflake Command Line Interface (public preview soon): The open-source CLI can be integrated into developers’ CI/CD pipelines to streamline data management and automate Snowflake-related changes, enabling them to define Snowflake infrastructure as code, automate deployments, perform testing and validation, and integrate with other CI/CD tools. 
• Event Tables (generally available): With Event Tables, developers can analyze log telemetry in Snowflake to troubleshoot and debug faster. 

Ready to build? Join Powered by Snowflake - a program that helps you build, market, and operate your applications. 

Forward Looking Statements
This press release contains express and implied forward-looking statements, including statements regarding (i) Snowflake’s business strategy, (ii) Snowflake’s products, services, and technology offerings, including those that are under development or not generally available, (iii) market growth, trends, and competitive considerations, and (iv) the integration, interoperability, and availability of Snowflake’s products with and on third-party platforms. These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and assumptions, including but not limited to risks detailed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In light of these risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, actual results could differ materially and adversely from those anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statements. These statements speak only as of the date the statements are first made. Except as required by law, Snowflake undertakes no obligation to update the statements in this press release. As a result, you should not rely on any forward-looking statements as predictions of future events.  

Any future product information in this press release is intended to outline general product direction. The actual timing of any product, feature, or functionality that is ultimately made available may be different from what is presented in this press release.  

The “Powered by Snowflake Funding Program” is a program designed to drive awareness and creation of Snowflake Native Apps. Snowflake does not receive any compensation from the startups or the venture capital firms for their participation in the program. While the participating venture capital firms may invest in the startup companies, Snowflake plays no role in their decision-making process, and there is no guarantee that any particular company will receive funding through the program or that the target amount will be invested. Snowflake is not a registered broker-dealer, investment adviser, or other similar intermediary.