FP&A & Analytics Editor
Daniel covers planning, forecasting and financial analytics, focusing on how finance teams are using better data, technology and new planning methods to improve business decisions.
FP&A · Forecasting · Budgeting · Scenario Planning · Financial Modeling · Analytics · KPIs · Business Partnering
AFP’s 2026 benchmark finds the average budget still takes 8.7 weeks despite years of planning-technology investment. The teams reporting faster cycles are the minority that run structured scenario planning.
KPMG’s 2026 study of 1,013 finance leaders finds the strongest reported AI gains in decision speed, decision quality and forecast accuracy — not task elimination. Adoption is now broad; exceptional performance is not.
Snowflake and Databricks are pushing governed business definitions into the data platform itself — turning the semantic layer into the contract that decides whether finance AI answers with the company's real definition of revenue and margin.
AFP’s 2026 benchmark of 332 finance professionals finds structured scenario planning is still a minority practice, while the average budgeting cycle stays near nine weeks despite years of planning-technology investment.
Deloitte’s Q1 2026 UK survey shows cost and cash priorities jumping while CapEx appetite falls. The leadership shift is toward liquidity as optionality, reversible capital commitments and governance that can move faster than the annual plan.
EY’s survey of 1,610 finance leaders finds ambition running ahead of authority: most CFOs believe they should shape value creation, but only a quarter lead the investment decisions where returns are uncertain or long term.
AFP’s 2025 benchmark found unreliable and inaccessible data are still FP&A’s biggest technology obstacles, with spreadsheets nearly universal — the next upgrade is the information supply chain, not another application.
Gartner’s December 2025 market view put integrated, intelligent and continuous planning at the center of the category — while spreadsheets stayed nearly universal. The buying question is shifting to governed planning across connected data and AI.
By late 2025 finance leaders did not need another list of AI use cases. They needed a method for deciding what moves from experiment to repeatable, governed workflow.
A new generation of AI-native FP&A vendors is targeting the middle layer between source systems and spreadsheets. Aleph's Series B is a signal about what investors think is still unresolved in finance.
FP&A is moving from periodic forecasting toward a continuously updated view of the business — but spreadsheets, fragmented data and process design still stand in the way.
