Snowflake, a leading company in AI Data Cloud, announced the launch of Snowflake for Startups during the opening of its new AI Hub in Silicon Valley (SVAI). This program, which evolves from the Powered by Snowflake initiative, is designed as a comprehensive platform to help entrepreneurs and founders develop and scale enterprise-level AI applications within Snowflake’s AI Data Cloud ecosystem.
The offering combines new product features, strategic partnerships with venture capital firms, and collaborative opportunities, creating an environment conducive to technological innovation.
“Snowflake for Startups reinforces our commitment to the creators of the future,” states Stefan Williams, Vice President of Corporate Development at Snowflake. “This initiative consolidates the company’s most valuable resources — technology, investment, and community — into a single experience, providing a launchpad that enables innovators to develop, grow, and bring to market more quickly.”
Accelerating startups with managed AI
For many startups, the challenge of developing and securing AI infrastructure diverts critical resources and slows product development. Snowflake is providing self-service access to the same enterprise-grade AI infrastructure built by Cortex AI that powers products like Snowflake Intelligence, making it easier for startups to develop and scale their AI applications and agents. Startups gain dedicated access to inference capacity within Snowflake’s security perimeter, with the freedom to choose from a range of leading cutting-edge models. This enables them to build AI-driven agents and applications, distribute them across the Snowflake ecosystem, reach thousands of customers, and accelerate growth securely and swiftly.
“The magic of building on Snowflake is everything we didn’t have to do ourselves. We didn’t need to develop an independent AI platform or worry about security and governance from scratch,” says Assaf Henkin, Co-Founder and CEO of Jedify. “Snowflake handles all the complex infrastructure, allowing us to focus entirely on delivering contextual data layers powered by our Semantic Fusion™ technology, enabling powerful enterprise-grade AI applications. It’s the fastest path from idea to a reliable product.”
Driving innovation with venture capital
To accelerate growth for startups with venture funding, Snowflake is evolving how it collaborates with VC and investment firms, including Altimeter, Amplify, Blackstone, Capital One Ventures, Coatue, Greylock Partners, ICONIQ, IVP, Madrona Ventures, Menlo Ventures, Redpoint Ventures, and more. This also includes its first strategic venture capital relationship in the Asia-Pacific and Japan region with the Asan Nanum Foundation. This partnership provides firms early insight into pioneering AI startups building on Snowflake. They also receive free Snowflake access for their portfolio companies and opportunities to work with Snowflake’s technical and industry experts. This helps eliminate a key barrier for developing on an enterprise-grade platform, enabling startups to compete with established players without significant initial investment.
“Snowflake is at the epicenter of the AI and data revolution, giving it unparalleled insight into emerging trends,” says Pauline Yang, Partner at Altimeter. “By working with Snowflake, we equip our founders with the knowledge and tools to develop secure, native AI applications that address customer problems from day one.”
Growth with Snowflake
Snowflake for Startups provides a comprehensive toolkit designed to help new companies develop, launch, and grow through its:
- Go-To-Market Engine: Startups gain access to over 12,000 potential clients via the Snowflake Marketplace to accelerate growth and create new monetization opportunities for their applications and products.
- Snowflake Startup Accelerator: By providing developers with credits, engineering support, and unmatched marketing guidance, Snowflake’s Startup Accelerator has helped participants launch 28 operational products. The program’s increasing success is reflected in a 304% rise in applications this year.
- Snowflake Ventures: Snowflake Ventures anticipates increasing its investment pace by over 30% this year, actively driving the next generation of startups. This will raise the total number of portfolio companies and exits to over 65, including more than 15 early-stage companies invested in through the company’s startup programs.
- Innovation Spaces and Events at the SVAI Hub: Located strategically in Menlo Park, the SVAI Hub will offer dedicated coworking and event spaces, allowing startups to deepen their relationship with Snowflake while being close to key VC firms and leading AI companies. The coworking space at the SVAI Hub is scheduled to open next month with an initial group of over a dozen startups.
“Snowflake for Startups has supported us at every stage, even through Snowflake Ventures’ investment,” says Alexis Steinman, Co-CEO of Maxa, a winner of a Snowflake Startup Challenge and a recent Data Drivers Award recipient. “Snowflake was the best platform to develop our reasoning and verification technology, which is patent-pending and extends generative AI to traditional finance and business teams managing complex record systems. Collaborating with Snowflake allows us to focus on our unique value proposition while delivering immediate enterprise-grade confidence, scalability, and cutting-edge capabilities.”