Who owns Snowflake? Ownership structure explained (2026)

Snowflake sells a cloud data platform that lets companies store, share, and analyze data across Amazon, Microsoft, and Google clouds without managing the underlying infrastructure. Its pitch is separation of storage from compute, so customers pay for what they query rather than for idle servers. That model turned a startup incubated inside a venture firm into one of the most valuable software companies to ever list in the United States.

Ownership of Snowflake is a study in how quickly a cap table changes once a company goes public. At its 2020 IPO, a low-profile Silicon Valley firm called Sutter Hill Ventures held the largest position, a stake worth more than $12 billion on the first day of trading. Six years later, that concentrated founder-and-backer ownership has dispersed into the hands of index funds and public shareholders, and the company's own executives hold more visible stakes than its earliest venture backer.

This article breaks down who owns Snowflake now: the founders, the institutions, the executives in control, and how the structure evolved from a private venture bet into a widely held public stock.

Snowflake was founded in July 2012 in San Mateo, California, by Benoit Dageville, Thierry Cruanes, and Marcin Zukowski. Dageville and Cruanes were data-warehousing architects who had worked at Oracle, while Zukowski co-founded the Dutch database company Vectorwise. The three built Snowflake to rethink the data warehouse for the cloud era, and the company stayed in stealth until 2014.

The company has no traditional corporate headquarters. It designated Bozeman, Montana as its principal executive offices in 2021 after shifting to a distributed workforce, though its SEC filings still list an address in Menlo Park, California.

Snowflake's core product is the AI Data Cloud, a platform for data storage, analytics, secure data sharing, and, increasingly, artificial intelligence workloads through its Cortex service. For fiscal 2026, which ended January 31, 2026, Snowflake reported revenue of $4.68 billion, up 29% year over year, with product revenue of $4.47 billion. The company remains unprofitable on a reported basis, posting a net loss of about $1.33 billion for the year, driven largely by heavy stock-based compensation and continued investment in AI.

Snowflake is publicly held. It listed on the New York Stock Exchange on September 16, 2020, selling 32.2 million shares at $120 each to raise roughly $3.9 billion before expenses, the largest software IPO in history. The stock opened at $245 and more than doubled on its first day, briefly valuing the company near $70 billion. Snowflake had about 346.6 million shares outstanding as of its 2026 proxy, all of a single class of common stock. At IPO the company used a dual-class structure with high-vote Class B shares, but its 2026 proxy reports only one class of common stock, meaning the founder and insider super-voting shares have since converted.

Of the three founders, Benoit Dageville remains the most visible on the cap table. He serves as a director and the company's Chief Architect, and the 2026 proxy reports he beneficially owned 4,485,067 shares, or 1.3% of the company. Thierry Cruanes serves as chief technology officer and Marcin Zukowski in a senior engineering role, but neither sits on the board, and their individual holdings are not separately disclosed in the proxy because they are not named executive officers or directors. As is common after a company has been public for several years, no founder holds a controlling block, and the high-vote shares that once concentrated founder influence have lapsed.

Before going public, Snowflake raised roughly $1.4 billion across seven venture rounds. Sutter Hill Ventures seeded the company and led the first round; later rounds brought in Redpoint, Altimeter, ICONIQ, Sequoia, and Dragoneer. The table below traces the main private rounds through the IPO.

Sutter Hill Ventures is the defining name in Snowflake's early ownership. The firm did not just invest, it incubated the company as a venture studio, and its managing director Mike Speiser served as Snowflake's founding CEO and CFO from 2012 to 2014. At the IPO, Sutter Hill controlled roughly 20% of Snowflake, a position worth about $12.6 billion on the first day of trading against a total investment of under $200 million. That stake has since been sold down sharply. By the April 2026 proxy, Speiser personally held 2,655,789 shares, below 1%, and Sutter Hill no longer appears among holders above the 5% disclosure threshold.

Vanguard is now the largest disclosed holder. The index-fund giant reported 17,748,082 shares, or 5.1%, as of the 2026 proxy, the only investor above the 5% line. Other large index managers such as BlackRock typically hold comparable positions but fell below the disclosure threshold in this filing.

Altimeter Capital, ICONIQ Capital, and Sequoia Capital were the major growth-stage backers, each holding multibillion-dollar stakes at the IPO. Their positions have also been reduced over time as venture funds return capital to their own investors. Salesforce Ventures and Berkshire Hathaway each bought 2,083,333 shares at $120 in private placements that closed alongside the IPO, roughly $250 million apiece, a notable move for Berkshire given Warren Buffett's long aversion to new tech listings. That endorsement from a strategic backer whose own ownership structure reflects a mature enterprise-software incumbent signaled how the ecosystem viewed Snowflake's platform.

Snowflake's structure today is that of a mature public company: a single class of common stock, a board with a mix of founders, its former CEO, and independent directors, and an ownership base dominated by institutional and index investors rather than a founder or a controlling backer. Voting power is distributed roughly in line with economic ownership, so no individual can dictate outcomes at the ballot.

Sridhar Ramaswamy is chief executive officer, a role he has held since February 27, 2024. He joined Snowflake through its 2023 acquisition of Neeva, an AI search startup he co-founded after a long career leading advertising products at Google, and he ran Snowflake's AI efforts before taking the top job. The proxy reports he owned 651,328 shares, under 1%.

Frank Slootman, who led Snowflake through its IPO and hypergrowth as CEO from 2019 to 2024, is now chairman of the board. He remains one of the larger individual holders at 7,643,560 shares, or 2.2%, a bigger stake than any founder or early backer disclosed in the proxy. Benoit Dageville sits on the board as co-founder and Chief Architect. Brian Robins serves as chief financial officer, having succeeded long-time CFO Michael Scarpelli, who still held over 1.1 million shares as of the filing.

The board's lead independent director is Mike Speiser of Sutter Hill. Other directors include Mark Garrett, William Scannell, Jayshree Ullal, Kelly Kramer, Teresa Briggs, and Mark McLaughlin. The mix reflects Snowflake's transition: the venture incubator and the growth-era CEO still hold seats, but the board is now weighted toward independent enterprise-software veterans.

In 2024, attackers used credentials stolen by infostealer malware to break into roughly 165 Snowflake customer accounts that had not enabled multi-factor authentication. Victims included Ticketmaster, AT&T, Santander, and Advance Auto Parts, with AT&T alone exposing call and text metadata for around 110 million customers. Security firm Mandiant attributed the campaign to a financially motivated group it tracks as UNC5537. Investigators concluded no flaw in Snowflake's own platform was exploited, but the episode drew scrutiny of the company's default security settings, and Snowflake later moved to enforce MFA. For any company sitting on this much customer data, security exposure is a standing risk worth mapping in a formal risk register.

Snowflake has grown revenue quickly but has yet to report a net profit under standard accounting, largely because of heavy stock-based compensation. That compensation dilutes existing shareholders and has been a recurring point of criticism from investors, even as the company generates positive free cash flow on an adjusted basis. The gap between adjusted profitability and reported losses is the kind of margin question an EBITDA calculation helps frame.

Slootman's abrupt retirement in February 2024 sent the stock down more than 20% in a single session, a reminder of how much investor confidence had been tied to one executive. Ramaswamy has steadied the company and leaned hard into AI, but the transition underlined the key-person risk that accompanies founder- and CEO-driven software firms.

Snowflake's ownership arc shows what happens to a venture-backed company once the lockups expire and the index funds move in. At IPO, control was concentrated: Sutter Hill, the founders, and a handful of growth investors held the bulk of the shares and the votes. Six years later, that concentration has largely dissolved. Vanguard, a passive index manager, is the single largest disclosed owner, and no investor holds enough to steer the company alone. For public shareholders, that dispersion means governance rests on an independent board rather than a controlling founder.

The Sutter Hill story is the most striking piece. A firm that incubated Snowflake and once owned roughly a fifth of it has quietly exited most of its position, converting an under-$200 million bet into one of the most profitable venture outcomes ever. That is the venture model working as designed, but it also means the company's earliest and most patient owner is no longer a meaningful voice on the cap table. Investors weighing a stake today are buying into an institution-owned company, not a founder-controlled one. It is a useful contrast with a firm like Oracle's founder-heavy ownership, where the men who built Snowflake once worked and where a single founder still holds enormous sway.

Ownership also shapes strategy. Without a controlling holder, management answers to a broad base of institutions focused on growth, margins, and capital returns. That pressure helps explain Snowflake's aggressive push into AI and its willingness to spend on acquisitions like Neeva and Observe. The competitive stakes are high, with the company racing Databricks, the cloud providers, and legacy vendors for enterprise data workloads. Anyone sizing up that rivalry can compare it with who backs rival Databricks, which has stayed private and taken a very different funding path.

Finally, ownership matters for valuation. Snowflake trades on expectations of durable growth rather than current profits, so its market capitalization swings sharply with sentiment about AI and cloud spending. That makes it a case study in how a widely held, unprofitable-but-growing software company is priced, a question best examined with a disciplined business valuation tool rather than headline market-cap figures alone.

Sridhar Ramaswamy has been CEO of Snowflake since February 27, 2024. He joined the company through its 2023 acquisition of his AI search startup Neeva and previously spent years leading advertising products at Google. He succeeded Frank Slootman, who is now chairman of the board.

Yes. Snowflake trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker SNOW. It went public on September 16, 2020, in the largest software IPO ever, pricing shares at $120 and raising roughly $3.9 billion before expenses.

Snowflake was founded in 2012 by Benoit Dageville, Thierry Cruanes, and Marcin Zukowski. Dageville and Cruanes were data-warehousing architects who had worked at Oracle, and Zukowski co-founded the database company Vectorwise. The venture firm Sutter Hill Ventures incubated the company, and its partner Mike Speiser served as the founding CEO.

As of Snowflake's April 30, 2026 proxy, Vanguard was the only shareholder disclosed above 5%, holding 5.1%. Among insiders, chairman Frank Slootman held 2.2% and co-founder Benoit Dageville held 1.3%. Sutter Hill Ventures, once the largest owner with roughly a 20% stake at IPO, has sold down below the 5% disclosure threshold.

Snowflake raised about $1.4 billion in venture funding before going public, then roughly $3.9 billion in its 2020 IPO. Its private valuation climbed from $1.5 billion in early 2018 to $12.4 billion in early 2020. After listing, the stock more than doubled on day one to a valuation near $70 billion, and Snowflake's market capitalization was about $106 billion as of September 2, 2026.