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New research from Snowflake reveals business benefits of winning in the Data Economy

Only six percent of businesses globally use, access, and share data and data services in a way that grants them all the business benefits provided by a robust data strategy, according to new research from Snowflake, the Data Cloud company. The study of 1,000 business leaders and technology managers highlights the significant hurdles that the majority of organisations face in participating fully in the data economy.

The data economy, as defined by Snowflake, enables businesses to tackle the most complex business problems and elevate the services they can offer above their competitors. It allows them to build new revenue streams by taking tailored data products and services to their customers, partners, and any other organisation participating in the data economy.

At the helm of the data economy, according to the research, are the ‘Data Economy Leaders’, companies which develop strategies that democratise access to data, integrate new technology, and demonstrate the true business benefits of capitalising in the data economy. While many companies have ambitions to take advantage of data to give them the business edge needed to be successful, these organisations require guidance to lay the right foundations. In fact, according to the study, only 38 percent  of businesses surveyed globally and 40% across APAC are using data to inform the business decisions they make.

As part of the study, Snowflake identified the four key attributes an organisation needs to possess to become a Data Economy Leader. These include:

• Providing unimpeded access to data, no matter where the data users reside;
• Using data to inform all or most business decisions;
• Using data to a great or significant extent to advance strategic goals, such as growing revenue and identifying new business opportunities;
• Having the ability to share and access data securely with external organisations.

The organisations that possess these four attributes are considered Data Economy Leaders, and as a result achieve significantly more than those that don’t use, access or share data in these ways. For example, 77 percent of Data Economy Leaders globally experienced annual revenue growth over the past three years, while just 36 percent of ‘Laggards’ - the lowest-performing businesses surveyed - can say the same. Moreover, 60 percent of Leaders saw their market share grow over this period, compared to only 31 percent of Laggards.

The businesses that aren’t using their data to its full potential are being left behind by the competition, which actively use data to strategically support the company and make critical business decisions. For example, 85% of organisations surveyed globally and 83% across APAC reported that they use data or are soon planning to use data to identify risk and prevent fraud within their business - the most common use for how data is used - demonstrating a growing trend for businesses to use data in a preventative way, to protect themselves and their customers. In addition, 80% of organisations globally use or soon plan to use data strategically to launch new revenue streams or pricing models. Similar trends are seen across organisations in APAC. 82 percent of organisations globally use or are soon planning to use data to reveal new market opportunities, while in APAC it is 80 percent of organisations.

“Successful organisations will attain the business advantage that comes from access to data, data services, solutions, and collaboration - which can only be found in the data economy”, said Jennifer Belisssent, Principal Data Strategist at Snowflake. “Forward-thinking organisations are using all that the data economy offers to solve the most complex business problems, improve customer experiences and crack down on fraud. The Laggards that don’t yet have total control over all of the data they possess will find themselves falling behind of the competition, and potentially at increased risk of security threats”.

The data economy challenge

To join the data economy, businesses need to first get to grips with their data. However, many struggle to manage and effectively extract value from it. The ability to access all forms of data is an integral part of a data strategy, yet less than half--45 percent --agree they can easily access all available data through a single system/application and just half agree their data users have ubiquitous data access regardless of their location. Many organisations also fail to break down internal data silos, impeding data sharing and collaboration across an organisation’s business units - only 55 percent say that sharing can happen freely in their organisation.

Asked about the top barriers to using data strategically, a lack of investments from leadership teams was ranked 5th according to 13 percent percent of global respondents. 14 percent of global respondents cited trust barriers, while 15 percent cited cultural barriers to using data strategically. The top two barriers identified were lack of proper skills (19%), and the right tools and platforms (16%). In fact, just about half (51%) agree that they have a C-level mandate to become more data-driven, whereas almost two thirds (63%) of Data Economy Leaders have such a mandate. Many companies also believe that the technologies they use are not fit for the data economy. An effective data platform must be scalable and elastic and manage a near-unlimited amount of data, yet fewer than one-third of the IT respondents say their data management solutions are easily scalable. More importantly, less than one-quarter say their solution lets them share, access and integrate data in near real-time.

“Technology is a fundamental barrier stopping Laggards from fully participating in the Data Economy,” adds Belissent. “Most of these organisations are still using legacy on-premises technology which is not scalable or suitable for modern data needs. In contrast, Leaders are capitalising on data platforms in the cloud, enabling easier data management and access to near real-time data.”

Leading the data economy

While only constituting 6 percent of businesses surveyed, the Data Economy Leaders are present in all industries from healthcare and life sciences to technology to retail and CPG. Once plugged into the data economy, they are part of a mutually beneficial ecosystem, both providing and receiving significant advantages from sharing data and data-driven insights with other participants via data management technologies. A number of Snowflake’s customers are Data Economy Leaders, using data to reveal new market opportunities, streamline processes and deliver a more personalised customer service.

Australians back data diversity, but need more structure

Over half (58%) of Australian respondents have a fully developed and clearly articulated data strategy, and an internal data/analytics centre of excellence structure to centrally support this work. Two-thirds (66%) of Australian businesses have a data literacy program in place, and 63 percent are measuring outcomes although only 41 percent say the “majority” of all decisions are currently informed by data.

The study shows Australian data professionals have done a lot of the difficult preparatory work to have access to clean, reliable data: 61 percent can share and access data between internal business units, and similar proportions express confidence in the lineage, security and accuracy of data holdings.

However, the data still isn’t all in one place: 60 percent of Australian respondents can’t easily access all available data through a single system or application. In fact, 91 of the survey’s IT respondents say data is split between multiple cloud systems, a mix of cloud and on-premises systems, or only on-premises systems, which impacts ubiquity of access. Australian data users are also the least likely of any geography in the study to still access data even when technical system issues arise.

Quote to approve: “Australia is a case study for the overall research finding that technology is a fundamental barrier to Data Economy participation,” says Theo Hourmouzis, ANZ Managing Director, Snowflake. “As data professionals, we’ve had it drilled into us over a number of years the critical importance of starting with good, clean data. Many businesses now have the data basics down, but now need to ramp up their investments in technology platforms to pool and manipulate the data, making it more accessible, shareable, easily analysed and resilient to failure, if they are to realise their full Data Economy potential.”

Australian data leaders are most likely to run advanced analytics and AI on use cases such as forecasting business performance, targeted marketing and campaign optimisation. For most other data-oriented use cases - from fraud prevention and lead qualification, to personalisation, resource allocation and price modelling - access to more data from diverse sources was seen as the most valuable tool to achieve these outcomes

A deeper analysis of the Data Economy Leaders globally revealed several other areas in which its members considerably outperform their peers, with their strengths exhibited across three main pillars; people, process and technology.

People

• Strong leadership is essential if a business is to thrive in the data economy. For almost two-thirds (63%) of global Data Economy Leaders, there is a C-level mandate to become data forward.

Process

• Leaders are better at aligning data objectives across teams, with 62 percent having a data or analytics centre of excellence that coordinates data policies, and 54 percent enabling users to access all available data through a single system or application.

Technology

• At the core of every Data Economy Leader’s technology strategy is a cutting-edge cloud data platform offering the latest cloud architecture and features. Twice as many IT respondents in Data Economy Leaders (50%) describe the data storage and management technologies they use as ‘easily scalable and elastic’. Leaders draw upon a greater volume of data, in different forms, while breaking down silos and collaborating with both internal and external partners.

To find out more about the data economy, why it matters and how businesses can succeed within it, read the ‘How to Win in Today’s Data Economy’ report: https://www.snowflake.com/data-economy/data-economy-home/

Methodology

The survey was commissioned by Snowflake and was completed in November and December 2021. The survey was carried out across eight countries: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, Japan, the United Kingdom (UK), and the United States (U.S.). The 1,000 respondents consisted of C-level business executives and board members and senior technology managers.

About Snowflake

Snowflake enables every organisation to mobilise their data with Snowflake’s Data Cloud. Customers use the Data Cloud to unite siloed data, discover and securely share data, and execute diverse analytic workloads. Wherever data or users live, Snowflake delivers a single data experience that spans multiple clouds and geographies. Thousands of customers across many industries, including 241 of the 2021 Fortune 500 and 488 of the 2021 Forbes Global 2000 (G2K) as of January 31, 2022, use Snowflake Data Cloud to power their businesses. Learn more at snowflake.com.

Source: Snowflake Inc.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains express and implied forwarding-looking statements, including statements regarding Snowflake products, services, and technology offerings that are under development or not generally available, and the integration and/or interoperability of those products, services and offerings with third-party products and services. These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and assumptions, including those described under the heading “Risk Factors” and elsewhere in the Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and the Annual Reports on Form 10-K that Snowflake files with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In light of these risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, actual results could differ materially and adversely from those anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statements. As a result, you should not rely on any forwarding-looking statements as predictions of future events.

Theo Hourmouzis, ANZ Managing Director, Snowflake