AI
AI
AI
Cloud-native data analytics startup Sigma Computing Inc. has closed on an $80 million Series E funding round that doubles its valuation to $3 billion, almost a year to the day after its previous Series D raise.
Today’s round was led by Princeville Capital and saw participation from new investors Databricks Ventures, ServiceNow Ventures and Workday Ventures. Existing backers like Altimeter Capital, Avenir Growth Capital, D1 Capital Partners, Spark Capital and Sutter Hill Ventures also returned for a piece of the action.
Sigma’s valuation jump makes sense, for the company has managed to double its revenue over the last year. In April, it reported annual recurring revenue had reached $200 million, up from around $100 million one year earlier. It now has more than 2,000 customers and 1.1 million new active users compared to the previous year, with clients including Advanced Micro Devices Inc., Duolingo Inc. and JPMorgan Chase.
The startup sells a data analytics platform that sits above cloud data warehouses such as Snowflake, Databricks and Google BigQuery. It’s used by businesses to query and analyze live data through a spreadsheet-style user interface that eliminates the need for Structured Query Language expertise. It supports spreadsheet operations, SQL, Python and what Sigma calls “AI Apps” that all run against the data warehouse’s compute layer instead of copying data onto a separate system. Information technology teams retain full governance and security over their data
This architecture is what makes Sigma so appealing to the enterprise customers it’s targeting. Customers do not have to move or duplicate their data in any way, which means that all of the row-level security, column masking and access controls they’ve already configured and put in place will apply automatically to anything built using Sigma. In markets where data governance is both a regulatory requirement and an executive demand, it’s a lot more convenient than using traditional analytics tools that require companies to extract the data to another layer and rebuild all of those governance controls.
While Sigma has enjoyed a lot of traction, it’s not preparing to rest on its laurels. Instead, the Series E funding will help the company to redefine the nature of its value proposition for the artificial intelligence era. These days, it’s no longer focused only on standard business intelligence, but jostling to become the leader of a new category called “agentic analytics,” which barely existed a couple of years ago. Its core offering in this niche is called Sigma Agents, which are customizable, no-code AI agents that run inside third-party data warehouses and operate within their existing security and governance frameworks. Sigma Agents can operate interactively, where users chat with them and approve their actions one-by-one; autonomously, where the agent monitors data and executes workflows based on a schedule; and externally, where the agent makes API calls to third-party systems. The first Sigma Agents launched towards the end of last year, and the company said today it has now become the most rapidly-adopted product in its history.
Chief Executive Mike Palmer said Sigma’s agentic strategy reflects the broader tension in enterprise AI today. He explained that information technology teams must enable enterprises to move rapidly in areas like vibe-coded applications and agentic development, while also staying safe. “Sigma provides a trusted system to enable agentic analytics through vibe-coded applications while ensuring governance, reliability and security,” he explained.
The reference to vibe coding, which is the practice of creating software using natural language prompts, was deliberate. As more businesses pivot to developing applications this way, the risk of ungoverned and insecure outputs rises exponentially. The security bugs in vibe-coded apps have already drawn lots of scrutiny, and Sigma wants to provide the governance that vibe coding tools do not have.
Sigma isn’t alone in this pivot. SAP SE earlier this year announced more than 200 new AI agents at its Sapphire 2026 conference, while Google Cloud focused a lot of attention during its Cloud Next event on agentic AI. Snowflake Inc., another rival, recently announced it had struck a $200 million partnership with OpenAI Group PBC to embed AI agents directly into its data warehouse.
The participation of Databricks, ServiceNow and Workday in Sigma’s latest round might raise a few eyebrows, as these companies may all be viewed as potential competitors. But by investing in it, they’re signaling that Sigma’s platform is more of a complementary tool than a threat. Databricks Vice President Andrew Ferguson said the investment will help to support users that want to “begin with an easy-to-use spreadsheet interface and scale up to the power of AI apps.” Meanwhile, both ServiceNow and Workday see Sigma as a value added layer that can sit above their own platforms.
Princeville Capital’s Vivian Huang said she’s backing Sigma because enterprises are choosing it as a foundation for AI workflows and agentic analytics. “It has seen broad customer adoption from global enterprises to leading AI innovators,” she said. “The company’s warehouse-native architecture and strong operating discipline at scale positions it to lead how enterprises put AI to work on their data.”
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