Snowflake grows startup accelerator with $200M in new capital
Snowflake plans to expand its startup accelerator with $200 million in additional commitments, the tech giant that specializes in cloud-based data storage said Thursday.
The new injection of capital follows a string of activity by Snowflake over the past several months that illustrates that company’s growth ambitions.
The Snowflake Startup Accelerator, formerly known as the Powered by Snowflake Funding Program, invests in a broad range of early-stage startups. Notably, the accelerator invests in startups building AI-based industry-specific products on Snowflake. Startups in the accelerator receive technical support from Snowflake and access to co-marketing opportunities, as well as credits for Amazon’s public cloud, AWS.
Graduates from previous cohorts include Coalesce, Andrew Ng’s LandingAI, and Twelve Labs.
A portion of the fresh $200 million will come from Snowflake’s new and existing VC partners, including Bain Capital Ventures, Blackstone Innovations Investments, Bessemer Venture Partners, Capital One Ventures, General Catalyst, Greylock Partners, Hetz Ventures, Mayfield, NewBuild Venture Capital, NTTVC, and Virtue.
There’s some fine print to be aware of. Snowflake noted in a blog post that while participating VC firms may invest in Snowflake Startup Accelerator companies, there’s “no guarantee” that any particular company will receive funding or that the full target amount will be invested.
Snowflake, which also announced plans for a new 30,000-square-foot “AI hub” at its Menlo Park campus and a $20 million AI upskilling program, continues to invest aggressively in AI. Earlier this week, the company announced an expanded partnership with Microsoft to offer access to AI models from OpenAI. Late last year, Snowflake inked a multi-year partnership with Anthropic and acquired Datavolo, an AI data pipeline firm.
Snowflake’s strategy appears to be paying off. The company beat Wall Street analyst estimates for its most recent fiscal quarter (Q4 2024), notching $987 million in revenue.
Kyle Wiggers is a senior reporter at TechCrunch with a special interest in artificial intelligence. His writing has appeared in VentureBeat and Digital Trends, as well as a range of gadget blogs including Android Police, Android Authority, Droid-Life, and XDA-Developers. He lives in Brooklyn with his partner, a piano educator, and dabbles in piano himself. occasionally — if mostly unsuccessfully.
