What happened
Shares of Snowflake (SNOW -1.17%) climbed 6.8% on Friday after the cloud-based data warehousing leader announced an intriguing new healthcare-focused initiative.
So what
Snowflake wants to help medical professionals accelerate clinical research and improve patient care. To do so, it's launching the healthcare and life sciences data cloud. The platform is designed to foster the private, secure, and legally compliant exchange of patient records and trial data.
"The entire industry can benefit from this live, connected ecosystem to get access to the data they need when it's needed," Snowflake executive Todd Crosslin said in a press release.
Image source: Getty Images.
Snowflake has already lined up some noteworthy partners, including pharmaceutical company Novartis and health insurance provider Anthem. Novartis executive Loïc Giraud said Snowflake's new data cloud is helping his company glean insights by speeding up its ability to curate and share data.
Additionally, Snowflake has partnered with cloud infrastructure and application providers to make it easier for companies to deploy highly scalable software services and advanced technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). It's also working with leading consulting firms to show businesses how to make the most of the cloud platform.
Now what
Healthcare is a massive global industry that has grown in importance during the pandemic. The ability to gather, analyze, and securely share ever-growing amounts of vital medical data should help to advance scientific discovery and improve outcomes for patients. Snowflake's new cloud platform could help enable this -- and fuel its own growth in the process.
