At a Glance

  • Vena, a maker of financial planning and analysis software and a Microsoft partner, announced on Monday that a new artificial intelligence agent has cut budget cycles by more than 60% for private preview customers.
  • The new "Planning Agent" is designed to help FP&A teams accelerate budgeting, predictive forecasting, and scenario modeling, and runs "seamlessly" in Excel and other Microsoft products, Vena said in a press release.
  • "The Planning Agent is just our latest innovation that provides the confidence to take bold, decisive action needed to seize opportunities in a volatile economy," Vena Chief Technology Officer Hugh Cumming said in the release. "It empowers decision-makers to simulate outcomes, adjust strategies, and act with confidence—without the weeks or months required by traditional planning."

Deeper Dive

Toronto, Ontario-based Vena is one of many vendors competing in the global "CFO office software market," which is expected to grow from $71 billion in 2023 to $131 billion by 2028, according to global investment bank Carlsquare.

The market is benefiting from multiple tailwinds as finance chiefs seek to boost efficiency and adapt to "evolving expectations," the bank said in a report earlier this year.

"As CFOs become more strategic and less siloed in their responsibilities, the need for forward-looking analytics tools that can leverage both structured and unstructured data becomes more critical," the report said.

Cumming believes uncertainty in the current economic environment has further intensified the need for more advanced financial planning tools.

"If you're a manufacturer importing a lot of goods from different countries, you now have to continuously re-forecast your cost structure based on changing tariffs and trade agreements," he said in an interview.

Like many other companies in the software industry, Vena has been investing heavily in AI and increasingly focusing on agents. The company says its goal is to become the most widely adopted planning platform in the Microsoft ecosystem.

According to Cumming, Vena's Planning Agent entered private preview on August 22 for select customers and is expected to reach "general availability" in the first half of November.

During private preview, the company typically offers the product to up to 10 customers, he said.