Snowflake, Palantir team to simplify AI, insight generation

Improved interoperability

Snowflake and Palantir previously provided joint users with a connector, launched in January 2023, between Snowflake's platform and Palantir's Foundry platform for data integration and analytics. But the new partnership is designed to significantly improve integration between their platforms, according to Artin Avanes, Snowflake's head of core data platform.

This partnership is a win-win. Palantir gets a scalable data backbone, and Snowflake gains a front-row seat in some of the world's most mission-critical AI deployments. It's not just about data storage but increasingly operationalizing data to decisions.

Using the connector, joint customers had to move data back and forth between Snowflake and Palantir to build AI applications, such as chatbots and agents, and data products including reports and dashboards. Such data movement can result in significant expenses. In addition, it's complex and time-consuming, and it can result in accidentally exposing an enterprise's proprietary data.

The partnership eliminates such back-and-forth data egress with bidirectional, zero-copy interoperability enabled by native read/write capabilities between both Palantir Foundry and AIP and Apache Iceberg tables in Snowflake.

"This partnership significantly expands the scope of the existing Foundry Data Connector for Snowflake," Avanes said. "Previously, customers faced data movement challenges or integration complexity that slowed down their AI projects. This deeper partnership will … eliminate data silos that have traditionally been a roadblock to achieving next-gen AI outcomes."

Eliminating complexity and lowering data management costs are significant gains for users, according to Mike Leone, an analyst at Omdia, a division of Informa TechTarget. As a result, he noted that Snowflake's new partnership with Palantir is valuable for joint customers.

"By establishing seamless, zero-copy interoperability between Snowflake's Iceberg tables and Palantir Foundry, they eliminate the costly and inefficient process of duplicating data between the platforms," Leone said. "By doing this, customers will dramatically accelerate the deployment of mission-critical AI applications, and I expect that to translate into faster business outcomes."

Rebecca Wettemann, CEO of research firm Valoir, similarly called the partnership potentially significant for joint users. However, she noted that partnership announcements are increasingly common among data management and analytics vendors. Whether the one between Snowflake and Palantir eventually evolves into something bigger remains to be seen.

"This could present a significant opportunity for both Snowflake and Palantir customers to deliver integrated analytical and AI applications more quickly and with less friction," Wettemann said. "However, given the speed and volume of partnership announcements, it seems we've moved from speed dating to Bumble territory. Time will tell if this is a short-term romance or a long-term roadmap."

Simplification and cost savings for existing customers weren't the sole motivating factors for forming the partnership. By developing native integrations between their respective platforms, Snowflake and Palantir could attract new users, according to Avanes.

He said that by enabling easy and efficient interoperability, the partnership could make the combined use of Snowflake and Palantir appealing to a broader audience -- whether an enterprise isn't a customer of either vendor now or currently uses one's tools but not the other's.

"We see this as an opportunity to serve the needs of our customers today, as well as a compelling value proposition for companies on their AI journey," Avanes said. "We've always believed in prioritizing customer choice when it comes to the tools and technologies they choose to implement into their data stacks."

Toward providing customer choice, analytics vendors Snowflake partners with in addition to Palantir include Domo, Qlik, Sigma, Sisense and ThoughtSpot. Data management and AI vendors Snowflake has partnerships with that compete against Palantir include Alteryx and Informatica, among others.

Like Avanes, Ni noted that the partnership not only serves the needs of existing joint users but could also appeal to potential new customers.

"For both [vendors], this deal is a land-and-expand play," he said. "Snowflake gains an AI decisioning layer solution partner it didn't have, and Palantir can now offer unified data, governance and AI workflows without data duplication. That's a major productivity and compliance gain that both can offer."

In particular, Palantir's potential to provide an operational AI layer -- a bridge between AI models and business processes -- could lead to more joint customers, according to Leone.

"Snowflake is excellent at centralizing and governing an enterprise's data assets, but it is not inherently designed for the kind of complex, live operational decision-making that Palantir's AIP enables," he said. "The integration effectively presents Palantir as that seamless, high-velocity layer for a Snowflake user to move from simply analyzing their data to deploying powerful, action-oriented AI agents."

Despite the seeming synergy between Snowflake and Palantir, combining the two platforms may not be the perfect solution for all enterprises using AI to inform their business decisions and make their operations more efficient, Ni cautioned.

Each enterprise has its own governance requirements, budgets and other considerations, and the combination of Snowflake and Palantir may not be the right fit for some specific needs.

"Technically, the Palantir-Snowflake partnership is a strong architectural pairing," Ni said. "At the same time, data and AI leaders should evaluate operational governance alignment, total cost and integration ownership before assuming plug-and-play simplicity."

Wettemann, meanwhile, noted that as Snowflake continues to add tools that enable AI development and data science -- similar to Palantir's AIP -- the vendors could wind up with some overlapping capabilities that compete with one another.

"Both Snowflake and Palantir are focused on growth, and as Snowflake expands its … capabilities, there risks some conflict," she said.

Next steps

While native integration between Snowflake's AI Data Cloud and Palantir's analytics and AI capabilities is the essence of the new partnership, it does not necessarily represent the full breadth of the alignment between the vendors, according to Avanes.

However, he declined to specifically address how Snowflake and Palantir plan to progress as partners.

"Both Palantir and Snowflake are driven by providing value to our customers, and our partnership will remain aligned to that goal," Avanes said.

Ni noted that the partnership shows how Snowflake can expand beyond being a platform for managing data and developing AI to being one where decisions are made.

Further partnerships could similarly extend Snowflake's capabilities, he added.

"[The partnership] demonstrates how Snowflake can extend from a data cloud to a decision platform in a pragmatic, low-friction way that doesn't dilute its core focus on governance and scalability," Ni said.

Wettemann likewise noted that Snowflake could expand its offering through partnerships. But rather than merely provide integrations with partners, she suggested that Snowflake work with other vendors to jointly provide prebuilt applications.

"Real integration partnerships that provide more end-to-end, data-driven AI apps will help make Snowflake stickier with existing customers and more attractive to new ones," Wettemann said. "I expect we'll see Snowflake continue to expand partnerships with Salesforce, ServiceNow and other vendors that provide more prepackaged AI apps."

Eric Avidon is a senior news writer for Informa TechTarget and a journalist with more than 25 years of experience. He covers analytics and data management.