FP&A Tooling: Anaplan vs Pigment vs Power BI

The tools an FP&A function uses shape what it can do, how efficiently it can do it, and how much of its time goes on analysis rather than wrangling spreadsheets. As demands on FP&A have grown, specialist planning and analysis tools have emerged to replace or supplement the spreadsheets the function has traditionally relied on, and choosing and using them well has become part of the FP&A professional’s remit. Anaplan, Pigment and Power BI are three names that come up often in UK finance teams. They are not three versions of the same thing, and understanding what each is for, and how to think about FP&A tooling more broadly, helps the function make sound choices.

This guide is written for FP&A professionals and finance leaders thinking about tooling, whether choosing a new tool or getting to grips with the landscape. It covers the limitations of spreadsheets that drive the move to specialist tools, the categories of tool and what each is for, a perspective on Anaplan, Pigment and Power BI, how to choose and use tools well, the spreadsheet’s enduring place and the skills to hire for. It deliberately stays at the level of each tool’s purpose and character rather than a feature-by-feature or price comparison, because features and licensing change frequently. Before committing to any tool, check current capabilities and terms with the vendor and run a trial on your own data.

Why FP&A Outgrows Spreadsheets

Spreadsheets remain the most widely used FP&A tool, and for good reason: they are flexible, familiar and capable of a great deal. But as a function and its demands grow, their limitations start to show.

• Fragility and error risk. Large, linked workbooks are easy to break and hard to check, and the integrity of a complex model is genuinely difficult to assure.
• Collaboration and version control. When many budget holders submit numbers, files multiply, and maintaining a single source of truth becomes a full-time job.
• Scale and dimensionality. Planning across entities, products, cost centres, scenarios and months quickly becomes slow and unwieldy in a grid.
• Time. Analysts spend their days consolidating, checking and rolling forward files instead of analysing the business.

These limitations matter more as FP&A becomes more sophisticated: more data, more complex planning, more contributors, more need for reliability. Specialist tools are designed to address exactly these issues, providing robustness, controlled collaboration, a single source of truth and the capacity to handle scale. Understanding which of these problems is actually hurting your function defines what a good tool needs to fix, and helps you judge whether a move is justified at all. A team whose real issue is a poorly structured three-statement model may need better modelling discipline before it needs new software.

The Categories of FP&A Tool

FP&A tools fall into broad categories with different purposes, and understanding the categories is more useful than focusing on individual products.

Dedicated planning platforms are built for financial and operational planning, modelling and forecasting. They handle multi-dimensional models, workflow for collecting inputs from budget holders, version and scenario management, and controlled write-back of numbers. They are the specialist successors to the planning spreadsheet, and the natural home for processes such as driver-based planning and a rolling forecast. Anaplan and Pigment sit here, alongside other planning platforms such as Workday Adaptive Planning.

Business intelligence and visualisation tools are built for analysing and presenting data: dashboards, reports and self-service exploration. They are about reading and presenting numbers rather than building plans, though the categories overlap and many functions use both. Power BI sits here, alongside Tableau and Looker, which we compare in our guide to BI tools for Financial Controllers.

The underlying data and finance systems include the ERP or accounting system, the HR and CRM systems, and increasingly a data warehouse. Every FP&A tool depends on these for its data, and integration between them often decides whether a tool succeeds. Our article on data quality and the finance function covers why clean source data matters more than the tool on top.

The right tooling usually combines tools from different categories, each used for its strengths, rather than expecting a single product to do everything.

A Perspective on Anaplan, Pigment and Power BI

Against that categorisation, the three tools can be understood by their character and purpose.

Anaplan is an established planning platform built for complex, large-scale, multi-dimensional planning, and it is often chosen by larger organisations whose planning connects finance with sales, supply chain and workforce. Its strength is the robust handling of enterprise-wide connected planning. The considerations are the scale of implementation, which typically involves a partner and dedicated model builders, and the investment it represents, which tends to suit it to larger and more complex needs rather than simpler ones.

Pigment is a newer planning platform, also built for business planning and modelling, and generally positioned as a modern alternative with an emphasis on usability and flexibility. It addresses a similar need to Anaplan, collaborative planning beyond spreadsheets, with its own design and approach. As a newer entrant, the pool of experienced users is smaller, which matters when you come to hire.

Power BI is a different kind of tool: Microsoft’s business intelligence platform for analysing and presenting data through dashboards and reports. It works closely with Excel and the wider Microsoft stack, and advanced work relies on Power Query for data preparation and DAX for calculations. It is strong at reporting actuals against budget and forecast, with drill-down by entity or cost centre, but it is not designed as a planning platform. Some organisations add third-party write-back or planning extensions; whether that is a sensible substitute for a planning platform depends on the complexity of the plan, so check vendor terms and test it properly.

The key point is that these are not simply competing versions of the same thing. Anaplan and Pigment serve the planning purpose; Power BI serves the reporting and analysis purpose, and is frequently used alongside a planning platform to present its outputs. The comparison therefore depends entirely on what the function needs. Because capabilities evolve continually, the durable understanding is about character and purpose; current feature sets should be assessed directly when a choice is being made.

Choosing FP&A Tools Well

Choosing well means matching the tool to the function’s genuine needs, not adopting a tool because it is prominent or because a peer uses it. Start with what the function actually has to do: the planning, the analysis and reporting, the data, the number of contributors and the scale and complexity. A function with complex, multi-entity planning needs different tooling from one whose main challenge is clear monthly reporting.

A practical set of selection criteria:

• The problem to solve. Is it planning, reporting, or both? Write down the three processes that cause most pain.
• Model complexity. Number of entities, dimensions, scenarios and the frequency of reforecasts.
• Integration. Is there a tested connector for your ERP, payroll and CRM, and who will maintain it?
• Ownership. Can finance build and change the model itself, or will every change need a partner or developer?
• Total cost of ownership. Licences, implementation, training and ongoing support; implementation and people costs often outweigh licences. Check vendor terms rather than relying on published list prices.
• Skills available. Can you hire people who already know the tool, at a salary you can afford?
• Proof on your data. Insist on a trial or proof of concept using your own chart of accounts and a real budget cycle.

Two errors are common. One is adopting a powerful enterprise platform that exceeds the function’s needs, incurring cost and implementation burden without a proportionate benefit. The other is persisting with spreadsheets long past the point where a specialist tool would genuinely help. A finance team implementing a new tool alongside a busy close can also run short of capacity; bringing in an interim Financial Controller for a systems implementation is one way to protect business as usual while the project runs.

Using the Tools to Genuine Effect

Having the right tool is only half the matter; a powerful tool poorly used delivers little. Using FP&A tools to genuine effect means doing planning and analysis better, more robustly, more efficiently and with more insight, rather than rebuilding the old spreadsheet process inside new software. The opportunity is to redesign how the function works: fewer manual consolidations, cleaner workflows with budget holders, faster scenario and sensitivity analysis, and more time for commentary that drives decisions.

It also requires skills. A tool is only as good as the people operating it, and planning platforms in particular need genuine modelling capability to use to their potential. Investing in training, documenting the model and making sure more than one person can maintain it are what turn a licence into value. Finally, it means using each tool for its strengths: the planning platform for the plan, the BI tool for presenting results, and the spreadsheet for flexible analysis. This connects to the wider modernisation of finance, including AI, covered across our AI in finance hub.

The Spreadsheet’s Enduring Place

Despite the rise of specialist tools, the spreadsheet keeps an enduring place in FP&A, and moving to a planning platform does not mean abandoning Excel. Spreadsheets remain unmatched for ad hoc analysis, quick modelling, one-off board questions and the countless tasks where immediacy and flexibility are exactly what is needed. Excel itself has also moved on, with Power Query and Power Pivot for handling larger data sets and AI assistance available depending on licence; our guide to using AI inside Excel for finance covers the practical side.

The right perspective is therefore not spreadsheets versus specialist tools but the appropriate use of each: the specialist tools for heavy, recurring, collaborative planning where their robustness and control add value, and the spreadsheet for flexible work. Strong spreadsheet modelling remains a core FP&A skill that the specialist tools supplement rather than replace, and a function that combines the two gets the best of both.

Skills to Hire For

When hiring, tool familiarity matters less than the judgement to choose and use tools well. Product knowledge can be learned in months; modelling discipline and commercial judgement take years. The profiles we see most often:

• FP&A Analyst: strong Excel modelling, working knowledge of Power BI or a similar tool, comfortable maintaining an existing planning model.
• FP&A Manager: owns the budget and forecast process, can design a model structure, and links dashboards to the forecast. See what an FP&A Manager does.
• Head of FP&A: leads tool selection and implementation, manages partners and vendors, and makes sure the investment changes how the business plans.
• Planning systems specialist: a certified model builder or administrator, sometimes outside finance, who maintains the platform day to day.

Platform experience moves a candidate up the range rather than creating a separate band. The ranges below are from our FP&A Manager salary guide.

Interim Head of FP&A and financial modelling specialists run higher, typically £500–£750 a day in London. An interim is often the quickest way to deliver a planning or BI rebuild without overloading the permanent team. To test tooling judgement at interview, our FP&A interview questions include questions on model design and systems, and our FP&A recruitment page explains how we run these searches. For the professional frameworks behind the skills, see the CGMA Competency Framework and the ICAEW’s technology resources.

FP&A Tooling: FAQs

Is Power BI an alternative to Anaplan or Pigment?

Not usually. Power BI is a reporting and analysis tool; Anaplan and Pigment are planning platforms. Many functions use a planning platform for budgets and forecasts and Power BI to present the results.

When should an FP&A team move off spreadsheets?

When version control, consolidation time and error risk are consuming more effort than analysis, and when many contributors feed the plan. If the pain is mainly reporting, a BI tool may be enough.

How much do these tools cost?

Pricing depends on users, modules and deployment and changes regularly, so check vendor terms and get a quote. Budget for implementation, training and support as well as licences.

Should we hire for a specific tool?

Hire for modelling discipline and judgement first; tool experience is a bonus. Where a platform is already live and complex, prior experience of that platform shortens the learning curve considerably.