Passionned Group™

Snowflake ETL & Data Integration

Business Partner
By: Daan van Beek MSc
Business Partner
Table of Contents

In this background article we present a brief excerpt of our independent ETL & Data Integration survey of the software vendor Snowflake and its portfolio of products (such as Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform). Snowflake ETL & Data Integration scores better in our study than Actian but slightly worse than Precisely. Of all the categories in our study, Snowflake has the best performance in data management and scored the lowest on master data management. We have been able to establish this objectively. Within the context of ETL & Data Integration, we have researched the pros and cons of Snowflake Data Cloud, and listed them by theme (DI, extract transform load, data replication and data quality). We also display the distinguishing features of the most popular products like Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform et cetera.

How does Snowflake ETL & Data Integration perform on different criteria?

In our survey we also inspected the various tools of Snowflake software. More than 290 evaluation criteria were examined. The figure below gives good insight into the strengths and weaknesses of Snowflake Data Cloud, compared to other [survey name] tools. Please note that Passionned Group is 100% independent of the suppliers in our guide. We do not sell software licenses, we do not make deals or have any legal ties to the vendor. Among other things, we help and advise organizations in selecting the right ETL & Data Integration platform.

Score of Snowflake Data Cloud software.Figure 1: Strength-weakness analysis of the supplier Snowflake ETL & Data Integration. A top supplier can get a maximum of 100%. Reference: the ETL & Data Integration Guide 2023. Do you want to know more about our research? Check out our buyers guide for ETL & Data Integration.

The Snowflake analysis was conducted by collecting a lot of public big data and from there it was extensively analyzed to pick up every tiny detail. More than 270 documents have been reviewed from Snowflake in recent years. In this process both algorithms and the critical eye of a senior Data Integration expert played a distinguished role in validating the results.

Snowflake and their complete ETL & Data Integration product portfolio

Snowflake carries (a minimum of) 5 products in the field of ETL & Data Integration. Based on relevance we list the products of Snowflake below:

What is Snowflake Data Cloud?

Under this heading, we portrait Snowflake Data Cloud, including some of its features and any related products. This product group consists of Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace, Snowflake Cloud Data Platform and Snowflake Data Platform. Snowflake Data Cloud can be best characterized by the following properties:

  • data integration > data warehouse
  • data integration > data warehousing
  • data infrastructure > cloud platforms
  • data management > big data management > data lakes
  • data integration > ETL > SQL
  • data connectivity > AWS
  • data infrastructure > cloud platform
  • data management
  • data integration > ETL
  • data management > big data management > big data

Are you curious about all characteristics (100+) of Snowflake Data Cloud? In that case open the ETL & Data Integration Guide™ 2023 here.

Do you want to hire an experienced Snowflake Data Cloud specialist?

Do you want to hire an interim Snowflake Data Cloud consultant who can do a mountain of work for you and can help you to implement an Snowflake Data Cloud application? Our interim specialists are happy to help. Indeed, hiring Snowflake Data Cloud developers is not always expedient. Drop a message here and we’ll get back to you quickly.

Screen shot of Snowflake Data Cloud software.
Picture of Snowflake Data Cloud tools.
Snowflake Data Cloud in action
Figure 2, 3 and 4: Overlying images illustrate the functionality of Snowflake Data Cloud. Click on the image to enlarge it.

What is Snowflake Data Warehouse?

Under this heading, we provide a description of Snowflake Data Warehouse, including some of its features and any related products. This product can be defined by the following features:

  • data integration > data warehouse
  • data integration > data warehousing
  • data management > big data management > data lakes
  • data management
  • data integration > ETL > SQL
  • data management > data sources
  • data integration > data warehouse > enterprise data warehouse
  • data integration > data warehouses
  • data connectivity > JSON
  • data management > real-time

Do you want to know the intricacies of all the functions (100+) of Snowflake Data Warehouse? Then download our ETL & Data Integration Guide™ 2023 here.

Screen shot of Snowflake Data Warehouse software.
Picture of Snowflake Data Warehouse tools.
Snowflake Data Warehouse in action
Figure 5, 6 and 7: Overlying figures show the operation of Snowflake Data Warehouse. Click on the image to magnify.

What is Snowflake Marketplace?

In this paragraph, we provide a description of Snowflake Marketplace, including some of its features and any related products. Snowflake Marketplace can be best characterized by the following features:

  • data integration > data warehousing
  • data infrastructure > security
  • data management > big data management > data lakes

Do you want to know the intricacies of all elements (100+) of Snowflake Marketplace? Download directly our ETL & Data Integration Guide™ 2023 here.

Screen shot of Snowflake Marketplace software.
Picture of Snowflake Marketplace tools.
Snowflake Marketplace in action
Figure 8, 9 and 10: Overlying images illustrate the functionality of Snowflake Marketplace. Click on the image to magnify.

What is Snowflake Cloud Data Platform?

In this paragraph, we portrait Snowflake Cloud Data Platform, including some of its features and any related products. Snowflake Cloud Data Platform can be best defined by the following functionalities:

  • data connectivity > AWS
  • data integration > data warehouse
  • data integration > data warehousing
  • data management > big data management > data lakes
  • data infrastructure > cloud platform
  • data infrastructure > security > authentication
  • data integration > ETL > SQL
  • data infrastructure > security > authentication > oauth
  • data integration > data warehouses
  • data infrastructure > cloud platforms

Are you curious about all the functionalities (100+) of Snowflake Cloud Data Platform? Download the ETL & Data Integration Guide™ 2023 here.

Screen shot of Snowflake Cloud Data Platform software.
Picture of Snowflake Cloud Data Platform tools.
Snowflake Cloud Data Platform in action
Figure 11, 12 and 13: These three images give a first impression of Snowflake Cloud Data Platform. Click on the image to enlarge it.

What is Snowflake Data Platform?

Under this heading, we provide a description of Snowflake Data Platform, including some of its features and any related products. This product can be defined by the following properties:

  • data integration > data warehouse
  • data integration > ETL > SQL
  • data management > big data management > data lakes
  • data management > real-time
  • data connectivity > AWS
  • data integration > data warehousing
  • data infrastructure > cloud platforms
  • data management > big data management > big data
  • data management > real-time > real-time data
  • data integration > data warehouse > data marts

Are you curious about all characteristics (100+) of Snowflake Data Platform? Download the ETL & Data Integration Guide™ 2023 here.

Screen shot of Snowflake Data Platform software.
Picture of Snowflake Data Platform tools.
Snowflake Data Platform in action
Figure 14, 15 and 16: These three images give a first impression of Snowflake Data Platform. Click on the image to magnify.

Snowflake Data Cloud-tools and the version history

Recently, we see a stable development in terms of ETL & Data Integration functionality and support for operating systems and connectivity.

We investigated Snowflake’s most recent releases of its complete ETL & Data Integration proposition. Below you can see the progression of the versions of all the known versions of the ETL & Data Integration products of Snowflake:

  • Snowflake Data Warehouse: 101

Behind each product are the version numbers, the most recent versions are mentioned first.

Can you easily determine the licensing costs of Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform?

It is difficult to determine exactly how much a license of Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform costs because it depends on the country, the number of users (or the number of CPUs in the case of server software), the connectors to data sources, and at what point in the year you request a quote. And before the end of a fiscal quarter of Snowflake, you may be able to look forward to a decent discount. As part of a cloud-first strategy, it makes sense running the software in the cloud. Often you only pay for what you consume in resources. The purchase cost of Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform may not be the largest cost item, but maintenance and support do show up in your budget every year.

What makes Snowflake ETL & Data Integration unique?

In our study, we see that Snowflake in the field of ETL & Data Integration software has a number of specific features which may be the deciding factor in purchasing. This makes Snowflake Data Cloud more or less unique: data quality testing, self-service data warehouse, real-time data ingestion, data quality framework and cloud platforms.

The advantages and disadvantages of Snowflake Data Cloud

Tag cloud of the Snowflake Data Cloud software.Figure 17: Tag cloud with the strength-weakness analysis of Snowflake ETL & Data Integration

Below we listed all the pros and cons of Snowflake ETL & Data Integration, Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform, et cetera. These are not necessarily definitive because: Snowflake can currently work on creating new capabilities (such as support for amazon redshift, SOAP, google bigquery, ibm db2, jira, GIT, red hat, SOA, solaris and ios).

Share your opinion about Snowflake here

Leave a review about Snowflake ETL & Data Integration here. Your observations may then possibly be taken into consideration in an even more objective assessment of the scores of Snowflake Data Cloud.

1. Snowflake Data Management

68%

The vendor Snowflake has a good score in our objective ETL & Data Integration survey on the subject ‘Data Management’ with a score of 68%, compared to other vendors. The following criteria were used: CDC and data sources. In total, we examined 71 aspects in this category. Would you like to go into more depth with the subject ‘Data Management’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Study.

2. Snowflake Data Integration

60%

The company has a good score in our study on the subject ‘Data Integration’. The score amounts to 60%, relative to other vendors. The following criteria were used: cloud data integration, data integration projects and customer data integration. In total, we examined 167 features within this discipline. Are you planning to specialize further in the subject ‘Data Integration’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Guide. Or learn more about the following topics:

3. Snowflake Data Connectivity

47%

The company has a moderate score in our 100% vendor-independent ETL & Data Integration survey on the section ‘Data Connectivity’. The score amounts to 47%, compared to other vendors. The following criteria were used: sql server, salesforce, apache and microsoft sql server. In total, we examined 50 aspects in this category. Are you excited about the subject ‘Data Connectivity’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Guide.

4. Snowflake Data Infrastructure

47%

Snowflake has a moderate rating in our current ETL & Data Integration survey on the subject ‘Data Infrastructure’. The score amounts to 47%, compared to other vendors. We considered the following factors: security, rest API, open source, operating system, interoperability, data transfer and microservice. In total, we examined 87 criteria within this section. Are you excited about the subject ‘Data Infrastructure’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Guide.

5. Snowflake Data Governance

44%

Snowflake has a moderate rating in our study on the subject ‘Data Governance’, given that they score 44% on this, compared to other vendors. We used the following selection criteria: data protection and data privacy. In total, we examined 11 criteria within this section. Are you planning to specialize further in the subject ‘Data Governance’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Guide 2023.

6. Snowflake Metadata Management

44%

Snowflake has a moderate score in our 100% vendor-independent ETL & Data Integration survey on the subject ‘Metadata Management’. The company scores 44% on this topic, relative to other vendors. We considered the following factors: metadata, data lineage, enterprise data catalog, business glossary and metadata repository. In total, we examined 7 aspects in this category. Would you like to learn more about the subject ‘Metadata Management’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Study 2023. Or learn more about the following topics:

7. Snowflake Data Quality Management

41%

Snowflake has a moderate rating in our study on the subject ‘Data Quality Management’, given that they score 41% on this, relative to other vendors. We considered the following factors: business rules, data cleansing, data quality rules, address verification and data quality issues. In total, we examined 28 criteria in this category. Would you like to go into more depth with the subject ‘Data Quality Management’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Study 2023.

8. Snowflake Data Replication

29%

The company has a poor rating in our 100% vendor-independent ETL & Data Integration survey on the subject ‘Data Replication’, given that they score 29% on this, relative to other vendors. We used the following selection criteria: database replication, sql replication, transactional replication, data replication framework and replication model. In total, we examined 32 features within this discipline. Would you like to go into more depth with the subject ‘Data Replication’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Guide.

9. Snowflake Self-service Integration

26%

The company has a poor rating in our study on the section ‘Self-service Integration’. The company scores 26% on this topic, relative to other vendors. We looked at the following criteria, among others: self-service data preparation, self-service data integration, self-service data warehouse, self-service data management, self-service data quality, self-service data profiling and self-service data cleansing. In total, we examined 8 features within this discipline. Are you planning to specialize further in the subject ‘Self-service Integration’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Study 2023.

10. Snowflake Master Data Management

18%

Snowflake has a poor score in our current ETL & Data Integration survey on the section ‘Master Data Management’ with a score of 18%, relative to other vendors. We considered the following factors: location data, master data replication and customer master data. In total, we examined 16 criteria within this section. Would you like to go into more depth with the subject ‘Master Data Management’? Then download here our ETL & Data Integration Study 2023.

Want to know more? Then order the ETL & Data Integration Guide™ 2023 here

The footprint of Snowflake ETL & Data Integration in different sectors

In our vendor-neutral ETL study, we also looked at which industries a software vendor specializes. These are the industries where Snowflake is frequently used: agriculture, banking, energy, financial services, governments, health care, insurance, logistics, public sector, real estate, retail and telecom.

Hire a Snowflake developer

Training and courses Snowflake ETL & Data Integration

We facilitate various training courses in the area of ETL & Data Integration but can also provide specific Snowflake training, for example as incompany. Then think about the following software: Snowflake Data Warehouse, Snowflake Marketplace and Snowflake Cloud Data Platform. Of course we frame the training with the ideas of the intelligent, data-driven organization.

In conclusion: Snowflake Data Cloud scores reasonably well

Snowflake has a minimal product portfolio with which it scores reasonably well in our ETL & Data Integration survey. Snowflake ETL & Data Integration innovates (approximately) at an average rate of less than 5 features per year, is active (for now) in lots of different sectors, and growing high in the field of data management.

About Passionned Group

logo of Passionned Group, the Snowflake ETL & Data Integration specialistPassionned Group specializes in 100% independent ETL & Data Integration consulting and the implementation of ETL & Data Integration solutions. Our driven and passionate consultants help small and larger organizations to advance as a smart, data-driven business.

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Daan van Beek - Business Partner

DAAN VAN BEEK MSc

Business Partner

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Fact sheet

Number of organizations serviced ___
Number of training courses ___
Number of participants trained ___
Overall customer rating 9.3
Number of consultants & teachers ___
Number of offices 3
Number of years active 18