Mapbox Launches A Snowflake Native App
The Mapbox Snowflake Native App enables Snowflake customers to unlock the value of addresses and geospatial data with simple SQL statements.
Topics
Mapbox, a location data platform for mobile and web applications, announced the availability of its new Snowflake Native App on Snowflake Marketplace.
Snowflake customers can install and run the app within their Snowflake account, enabling data analysts and decision makers to use a variety of Mapbox geospatial services directly within the Snowflake Data Cloud.
Data analysis that would have previously required direct interaction with APIs can now be completed with simple SQL statements. Snowflake customers can use Mapbox to match addresses to geographic coordinates, translate raw coordinates to addresses, and aggregate data by geographic boundaries.
Snowflake, a data cloud company, announced that the Snowflake Native App Framework is available for developers to build and test apps natively in the Data Cloud with additional distribution and monetisation capabilities in public preview soon. Snowflake Native Apps usher in a new era of data collaboration, enabling developers with the tools needed to create robust apps quickly with Snowflake’s always-on availability and auto-scalability, all the while reducing security and privacy hurdles for customers because the apps run directly within the customers’ Snowflake accounts.
“The Mapbox Snowflake Native App expands the availability of location services for thousands of customers on Snowflake Marketplace,” said Chris Child, Senior Director of Product Management, Snowflake.
“We are excited to join Snowflake in enabling easy access to location intelligence for the Snowflake community,” said Sean Graber, Head of Search, Mapbox. “The Mapbox Snowflake Native App gives more customers, especially non-developers, easy ways to harness the business value of geospatial data, and all within the Snowflake Data Cloud environment where they are already building.”
Clean up and convert location data
Users of the new Mapbox Snowflake Native App can tap into the Mapbox Geocoding API in order to validate and correct messy location data (such as long lists of non-standard addresses), convert text addresses and place names to geospatial coordinates, and translate raw location coordinates into text addresses. The Mapbox Geocoding API uses advanced batch processing to achieve lightning-fast processing time, even while processing hundreds of billions of queries daily. The Snowflake Native App also offers the ability to retain query results for future use.
Geocoding is valuable for companies in virtually every industry. In sectors like retail, telecommunications, healthcare, or insurance, providers can use geocoding to validate and analyse customer addresses to understand where clients are located to optimise service and direct marketing campaigns. Trucking, shipping and logistics companies can use ‘reverse geocoding’ to convert geographic coordinates generated from automated tracking devices into addresses to better understand where assets or shipments are located and support compliance with regulations, such as the International Fuel Tax Agreement, which requires companies to pay fuel taxes based on travel time in various jurisdictions.
Aggregate and analyse data according to geographic boundaries
The second major feature of the Mapbox Snowflake Native App is the ability to aggregate and analyse geospatial data using Mapbox Boundaries, an industry-leading dataset of 5 million polygons of administrative, political, statistical, postal, national, state, city, and locality borders across every country and at multiple levels of jurisdiction. Mapbox Boundaries polygons are edge-matched and topologically accurate – ensuring that there are no gaps or overlaps that introduce errors into analysis.
Using Mapbox Boundaries data, Snowflake users can use point-in-polygon analysis to aggregate geocoded data by jurisdiction, including multiple types of boundaries not included in typical geocoding products. Data analysts can identify and report on insights by aggregating data to various administrative or statistical levels. Sales teams can assess territories or the distribution of customers. Political organisations can aggregate address data by federal or state legislative districts to inform fundraising and other analytics.
