Summary
On August 7, 2026, Snowflake reached general availability for Cortex Agents and MCP servers delivered as Snowflake Native Apps, letting agents and MCP tools run next to governed enterprise data. Alongside it, Snowflake launched Cortex AI Gateway, a centralized control layer that governs how AI agents access enterprise data, tools, and models and helps prevent runaway costs.
What changed
Snowflake made Cortex Agents and MCP servers generally available as Native Apps, so agents and Model Context Protocol servers run inside the Snowflake data perimeter. Snowflake also introduced Cortex AI Gateway, a centralized governance layer over agent access to data, tools, and models, with a wide model catalog (GPT, Gemini, Claude, Grok, Mistral, GLM, and more).
Why it matters
Running agents and MCP servers as governed Native Apps next to the data avoids moving sensitive enterprise data out to external agents, and a central gateway addresses cost and access control. It strengthens the data platform as the place to build and govern agents, competing with cloud-vendor agent runtimes on data proximity and governance.
Evidence excerpt
Snowflake Native Apps: Cortex Agents and MCP servers reached general availability on August 7, 2026. Snowflake also launched the Cortex AI Gateway, a centralized control layer designed to govern how AI agents access enterprise data, tools, and models, with a wide model catalog (GPT, Gemini, Claude, Grok, Mistral, GLM).