Cloud data warehouse company Snowflake Computing Inc. is launching a Private Data Exchange service that will act as a centrally and internally managed data hub for customers that need a way to privately share data sets between specific users.

The new offering builds upon the original Snowflake Data Exchange that was announced in June. Data Exchange is basically a marketplace for Snowflake customers who wish to conveniently access third-party data from a variety of sources, and does away with the need to access such data via an application programming interface. The main benefit of Data Exchange is it means faster access and more control of the data, the company said at the time.

The Private Data Exchange is a bit different. Organizations can create their own internal data marketplace where they have full control over which data assets are available, and who has access to them. In other words, it’s all about helping organizations to maintain control over the data their employees use.

“The Private Data Exchange represents the future of managing and sharing data broadly and securely inside enterprise and institutional boundaries,” Snowflake Chief Executive Frank Slootman said in a statement. “The data exchange model will become the deployment standard for exploring, discovering and sharing data enterprise-wide.”

Snowflake said the main advantage of Private Data Exchange is that it provides a centralized location from which analytics and data science teams can access secure data, thereby improving both data integrity and security and leading to “shortened time to insights.” It also gives organizations a way to monetize data sets by sharing them with customers for a fee, Snowflake said.

Analyst Holger Mueller of Constellation Research Inc. said Private Data Exchange would be welcomed as it’s a challenge for enterprises to enable best practices when it comes to “data-as-a-service.”

“It requires not only a working software platform but also trust between the participating parties,” Mueller said. “It’s natural for enterprises to want to get started in the DaaS era with a private data exchange that they can control directly, and that’s the demand Snowflake is tapping into now, enabling best practices for DaaS.”

Image: Snowflake