Snowflake: Fundamental Bottom?

Snowflake's Shocking News and CEO Change

On February 28, 2024, Snowflake released its fiscal fourth-quarter financial report, providing embarrassing full-year guidance and delivering another piece of news that shocked the U.S. Data Infra industry.

Frank Slootman, one of the most legendary CEOs in U.S. software history, announced his resignation from the position of Snowflake's CEO. The new CEO is Sridhar Ramaswamy, the Indian-born founder of Neeva. Sridhar joined the company after selling Neeva to Snowflake in May of the previous year and served as Snowflake's AI SVP, responsible for all new AI businesses. In less than a year, he went from being the founder of an acquired company to the new CEO of the parent company.

Snowflake CFO Michael Scarpelli mentioned in an investor communication a week after the financial report, "I didn't know about Frank's resignation until Tuesday (the financial report was on Wednesday)," "but as Frank and the board spent more time with Sridhar over the past year, we felt he might become Frank's successor." Scarpelli is Frank's old friend, and the two were a golden partnership at ServiceNow before joining Snowflake together. Outside of work, they also maintain a good personal relationship, both residing in Bozeman, Montana. Scarpelli might have been as shocked as we were.

Snowflake's angel investor and first CEO, Mike Speiser, later spoke about Frank's departure: