Vena vs Cube for teams that stay in Excel

Vena’s 26 Aug 2026 consolidation post cites its 2026 FP&A Impact Report: 90% of finance professionals surveyed still use Microsoft Excel for modeling and reporting. The shortlist fails when that 90% is treated as one job. On 4 Oct 2026 Cube’s spreadsheet page still described a fetch into an existing template and a publish that writes the edit back.

Keeping the spreadsheet is not the same replacement. The 26 Aug 2026 post names workflow, versioning, period locking, entity-level security, audit history, and data provenance. Cube’s spreadsheet page names a fetch into the template and a publish logged with before and after values.

Overview

	Vena	Cube
Primary use case	Planning, consolidation, and close, with workflow, versioning, and audit history on the governed record	Planning, forecasting, and reporting from one governed model, with a logged publish
Day-to-day workflow	A Contributor moves through workflows and adds inputs. A Power User manages the model. View Only reviews reports and can open workflows	Fetch pulls values into the template. Publish writes the edit back and logs before and after. AI Hub routes a question to an agent team. The Planner Agent saves a new scenario
Main buying consideration	Whether the order is Professional or Complete, and whether Financial Consolidation is the independent product named on 26 Aug 2026	Which of Bronze, Silver, or Gold is on the quote

Vena’s security page describes a cloud platform and annual SOC 1 and SOC 2 Type II audits conducted by Deloitte. Cube’s security page says the service runs on Amazon Web Services, with a SOC 2 Type II examination by Dansa D’Arata Soucia, and states HIPAA compliance. Cube’s pricing footer also prints SOC 1.

We reviewed Vena’s pricing page, Excel product page, security page, and 26 Aug 2026 consolidation post, and Cube’s pricing page, spreadsheet page, security page, and the help article updated 6 Jul 2026.

Vena

Cube

Editions and pricing

On 4 Oct 2026 neither public pricing page showed a figure with currency, unit, period, commitment, and included product, so this page states no amount.

	Vena	Cube
How it is sold	Two named plans, Professional and Complete. License types on the same page are Power User, Contributor, and View Only. The glossary says import APIs are included and export APIs carry an additional fee. No amount is printed	Three named plans, Bronze, Silver, and Gold, each behind a custom quote. Premium Support+ is an add-on on any plan. The 6 Jul 2026 help article describes an AI credit balance and admin top-ups, with no credit price
Names on the public page	Professional includes the platform, a Customer Success Manager, Standard Support, the Customer Portal, and Vena AI. Complete is that set plus Vena Insights, Premium Support, a sandbox, and Expert Managed Services	Bronze’s included list is platform access, custom roles, unlimited dimensions and users, and unlimited dashboards. Silver’s list adds Slack and Teams, workflow automation, PowerPoint and Slides, and MCP integration. Gold’s heading names premium support and custom modules; the included bullets shown match Silver
What moves the order	A Power User manages the model. A Contributor works inside workflows and adds inputs. View Only reviews reports and can open workflows. Financial Consolidation, generally available 26 Aug 2026, can be purchased independently. The pricing page does not name that product inside Professional or Complete	A block on the pricing page says FP&Agents across four teams, Data Managers, Analysts, Planners, and Business Partners, plus the MCP server, on every tier. Bronze’s included bullets do not repeat the MCP line. This page does not treat that shorter list as proof the every-tier sentence is void
Main buying consideration	Count Power Users separately from Contributors and View Only, and ask whether the 26 Aug 2026 consolidation product is on the order by itself	Ask which plan is quoted, and read the Bronze, Silver, and Gold bullets

Workflow

Vena’s pricing page is the control for who touches the model. Cube’s help article updated 6 Jul 2026 is the control for task reminders, the Planner Agent, and who may run Charlie. Shared words such as workflow are overlap, not a shared permission model.

	Vena	Cube
Who moves the work	Contributor: navigate workflows and add inputs. Power User: manage the financial model. The 26 Aug 2026 post adds workflow around consolidation, including intercompany eliminations, currency translation, ownership structures, and top-side adjustments	The help article says workflow enhancements are available for all customers: one summary email when tasks are assigned, a reminder 2 days before a task is due, and a reminder every 3 days while it is overdue. Silver and Gold included lists also name Workflow Automation
What an agent may change	Professional’s included list names Vena AI. The 26 Aug 2026 post says that, at general availability, Vena AI uses trusted financial data and consolidation context inside Vena’s permissions and workflows. Vena Omega is described on that post as later work, not as a current control	AI Hub routes a plain-language question to an agent team. Charlie, the renamed AI Analyst, needs Use Charlie. The Planner Agent needs Use AI Planner, saves a new scenario under Planner Scenarios, and does not modify Budget, Forecast, or Actuals. MCP write-back is a separate permission, and an AI write lands only on a scenario the AI created or one opened for AI write-back
What is gated	The 26 Aug 2026 post names entity-level security, period locking, and versioning on the consolidation process	Fetch and publish rights follow the saved report. Data Access Scope still applies to Charlie: a scenario the user cannot open is a scenario Charlie cannot read. Assumptions in the Planner are tagged User or AI
Main buying consideration	Whether contributors must move through a workflow that includes period locking and entity-level security, as named on the 26 Aug 2026 post	Whether the quote’s plan is enough for Slack, Teams, and workflow automation, and which of Use Charlie, Use AI Planner, and MCP write-back an admin will grant

Audit history and the publish log

The 26 Aug 2026 post is Vena’s dated list of close controls. Cube’s spreadsheet page is the dated description of the publish log, and the 6 Jul 2026 help article adds the undo limits and the AI write flag. A control named on one of those pages is not proof the other product lacks it.

	Vena	Cube
What the record stores	Audit history and native data provenance on the 26 Aug 2026 post: where data came from, which rules and adjustments were applied, what changed, and how the consolidated result was produced. The Excel product page names activity tracking and audit trails. The Microsoft 365 page names drill saves for who entered a value and when	The spreadsheet page: every publish is permission-gated, logged with before and after values, and undoable. A multi-range publish on the 6 Jul 2026 help article produces one grouped audit entry. An MCP write is attributed to the user and flagged as AI-originated in the audit trail
Reversal and lock	Versioning and period locking, named on the 26 Aug 2026 post. That post does not describe an undo-publish action	Undo Publish, on the 6 Jul 2026 help article, reverses the user’s own publish only when a later publish, import, or system event has not changed the data. Write-protected scenarios block undo
Trace to source	Data provenance on the consolidation post, from source data through translation, eliminations, and adjustments	Drilldown from a fetched value to the transactions behind it, on the spreadsheet page. The Planner’s Analysis tab traces a figure to the data it came from
Main buying consideration	Whether the close has to include the 26 Aug 2026 set: workflow, versioning, period locking, entity-level security, audit history, and data provenance	Whether the requirement is a publish log with before and after values, undo under those limits, and an AI write flagged in the same trail

Favor Vena when the documented requirement is the 26 Aug 2026 post: workflow, versioning, period locking, entity-level security, audit history, and data provenance. Favor Cube when the documented requirement is the spreadsheet page’s publish, permission-gated and logged with before and after values, undoable only inside the 6 Jul 2026 limits.