What Are the Benefits of Snowflake for Your Organization?
by Spencer Nguyen • May 13, 2022
In January 2022, Snowflake revealed it had over 5,900 customers, including 241 companies in the 2021 Fortune 500, making it one of the most popular cloud-based data warehouses on the planet. In short, the platform provides a single source of truth (SSOT) for all data that flows in and out of your organization, enabling you to run that data through business intelligence (BI) tools for deep data analysis. But with so many data warehouses on the market—Amazon (AWS) Redshift, Microsoft Azure, Google BigQuery, etc.—why use Snowflake in your enterprise?
Here are some of the benefits of Snowflake and how DreamFactory makes it easy to connect data sources to this warehouse.
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What Is Snowflake?
Snowflake is a data warehouse that enables database storage, data processing, and analytics. Its developers didn't build the platform on an existing database or software program such as Hadoop; Snowflake combines an SQL query engine with architecture created for the cloud.
So why use Snowflake? Well, the data warehouse collects and stores structured and semi-structured data from multiple "siloed" sources that might exist in your organization. Those sources might include databases, relational databases, transactional databases, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, SaaS tools, and other data platforms. By moving data to a centralized location like Snowflake, you can remove data silos—repositories controlled by departments that are isolated from the rest of the organization—and store your data in a single location for more effective analysis.
There are many benefits of Snowflake, but moving data to the platform can be a challenge. DreamFactory's disruptive software provides an alternative to data warehousing by letting you create a live, standardized, and documented REST API quickly and easily.
Pricing
Snowflake uses a pay-as-you-go model, where you pay for the amount of data you move to the platform. Depending on your data management needs, pay-as-you-go models like this can be expensive. One of the benefits of Snowflake is its ability to save you money by pausing clusters when you don't run any queries on the platform. (Snowflake will resume clusters when you run queries again.)
Usability
Unlike data warehouses such as Oracle, Snowflake automatically applies all fixes, upgrades, and security patches to its warehouse cloud infrastructure, removing the need for an expensive database administrator. The platform also takes care of concurrency, indexing, file size, compression, metadata, structure, partitioning, and other data management tasks.
Why Use Snowflake? Features
Here are some of the Snowflake features that you need to know about:
- Snowflake has an integrated automatic query performance optimization feature, letting you query data without advanced coding knowledge.
- The platform's storage layer is independent of its compute resources.
- You can scale your warehouse and benefit from additional computer resources thanks to the elastic nature of Snowflake's cloud architecture.
- You can use both structured and semi-structured data simultaneously for analysis without converting it into a fixed relational schema. Snowflake handles schemas for you.
Data Security
Snowflake offers security features such as data encryption, IP blocklists, multifactor authentication, access controls, and adherence to data security standards such as PCI DSS. The platform also has a SOC Type II certification and supports PHI data for companies that need to comply with the HIPAA data governance framework. Users can also manage data stewardship and data quality workflows to ensure compliance with GDPR.
Moving data to Snowflake can involve lots of programming and data engineering experience, making data integration an ongoing problem for companies like yours. DreamFactory lets you create a REST API for Snowflake in as little as five minutes.
What Do Users Say About the Snowflake Data Warehouse?
Why use Snowflake in your organization? It currently has an average user score of 4.5/5 on the technology review platform G2.com, making it one of the top-rated cloud data warehouses for real-time data analytics.
Here's what some users say about the Snowflake data warehouse solution:
- "I like the power and capability of Snowflake, as well as its aesthetic user interface. It's not only a database—with SQL and all you'd expect there—but it also provides tremendous functionality for sharing and controlling access." — David W.
- "Snowflake gives you the opportunity to start small and grow quickly, while not overspending upfront. It has completely transformed our ability to deliver analysis of large data sets." — Michael S.
- "Snowflake has a very clean UI, and it is simple to use. After about a week of playing around, I understood how most of the functionality worked in the tool, which saved me so much time." — An administrator.
What You Should Know Before Moving Data to Snowflake
Snowflake is a powerful data warehouse for analysis; however, moving data sets to the platform can be tricky, especially if you lack data engineering skills. This process typically involves something called extract, transform, and load (ETL), where users have to extract data from a source, transform that data into a suitable format for analytics, and then load data to Snowflake.
ETL and other data integration techniques like extract, load, and transform (ELT) require advanced skills. Enterprises that want to integrate data with Snowflake usually need to build complex big data pipelines and learn SQL—the programming language used by Snowflake. DreamFactory can solve these issues by connecting your data to Snowflake via a live, documented, standardized REST API. All you need is your Snowflake credentials, and open-source DreamFactory will take care of the rest.
Generate a full-featured,documented, and secure REST API in minutes.
Sign up for our free 14 day hosted trial to learn how.
Getting Started with DreamFactory
The benefits of Snowflake include features like integrated automatic query performance, schema management, improved scalability, and enhanced data security. The platform can also pause clusters when not running queries, potentially saving you money. Ultimately, Snowflake will centralize the data in your organization, allowing you to identify patterns and trends in business-critical information and improve decision-making.
Create a Snowflake REST API with DreamFactory’s open-source tools. DreamFactory will generate OpenAPI documentation and secure your API with keys, making data integration easier than it's ever been. Get started today with a 14 day free trial.
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As a seasoned content moderator with a keen eye for detail and a passion for upholding the highest standards of quality and integrity in all of their work, Spencer Nguyen brings a professional yet empathetic approach to every task.
