Key Takeaways from Snowflake Industry Day 2024

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Building on the momentum from Snowflake Summit, where Snowflake announced the rollout of dozens of new features, this year’s Industry Day showcased the numerous ways these capabilities can be put to use, particularly in an AI- and ML-driven world. In his keynote address, Snowflake CEO Sridhar Ramaswamy explained how the AI Data Cloud aligns with customers’ AI and data strategies, highlighting the platform’s unique position to achieve enterprise AI goals. Behind its commitment to open source, through initiatives like Polaris Catalog and Iceberg tables, Snowflake and its network of partners are helping customers achieve their data and AI objectives, and Ramaswamy shared several of their success stories. “Our ecosystem enables companies to build faster, scale efficiently and accelerate the innovation we can deliver together across industries,” he said.

Here are six more takeaways from an enlightening day:

  • Whether it’s marketing efforts or market analysis, every aspect of the financial services industry benefits from quicker time to insights — and the AI Data Cloud can certainly help deliver there. Insurance company Mutual of Omaha, for instance, showed how utilizing Hybrid tables (optimized for hybrid operational and transactional workloads) drastically cut down on latency issues, while secure data sharing with partners not only removed friction and costs but resulted in greater data accuracy. 

  • In media, where content is king, companies can maximize reach and retention by putting the power of data into the hands of regular business users. At Warner Bros. Discovery, a new gen AI chatbot, Daisy, was built to answer questions — both simple and complex, but all in natural language — about the wealth of information generated through WBD’s streaming platform, Max. By simplifying the process of finding out, say, where most of the people who watched “House of the Dragon” live, Daisy holds the power to democratize data across the enterprise.

  • Customer 360 efforts across brands, particularly in retail, require close and secure collaboration. For Topgolf Callaway, which has grown from strictly manufacturing equipment to now operating golf-based entertainment centers and ecommerce retailers, the AI Data Cloud breaks down the silos of their many subsidiaries and makes customer data more actionable to more people.

  • In industries like telecommunications, where the customer base is wide and diverse, it is sometimes difficult to narrow in on segments and, therefore, hard to meet specific customer needs and preferences. Machine learning models can help better identify and understand those segments and needs — as demonstrated by New Zealand-based telecom giant Spark NZ. The company, which provides telephone, broadband and mobile services to individuals and large enterprises alike, used Snowpark ML to get all its marketing analytics for its low-cost, prepaid mobile plans to run on the company’s advanced decision-making engine. The move accounted for an estimated $4 million in cost savings.

  • In highly regulated industries where data security is critical, like healthcare and life sciences, it’s important to develop a governance framework to put these data protections in place. Providence Health, a healthcare system that includes 51 hospitals and 1,000 clinics in the western U.S., outlined how Snowflake helps it balance the needs of compliance with real-time data access using key features like attribute-based access controls.

  • In the government and education sector, moving to a modernized data strategy doesn’t have to be a cost-prohibitive, labor-intensive undertaking. The Texas Department of Transportation sought a secure data platform that would provide a single point of truth and help drive actionable analytics and enhance decision-making. With Snowflake, the department not only eliminated legacy silos but put itself in a better position to integrate emerging technologies like AI and ML into its data management systems. 

The age of Enterprise AI is here, and industries everywhere are starting to reap the benefits. “For years, folks have thought that Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta were the only ones that can do AI that impacts their business,” Mac Noland, Chief Data Officer at IT consulting firm phData, said during an executive panel. “But the reality is the tools are advanced. Now, whether you’re a construction company or a company that makes cereal, you can use AI to impact your business. It’s being done — and done in production.”

To learn more about how AI is shaping different industries and can transform your business, catch up on the Industry Day talks by registering for the on-demand event here.