July 2026 Summaries

Cloud unit cost economics tools help organizations connect infrastructure spending to business measures such as cost per customer, transaction, API call, or product unit, supporting decisions on pricing, margins, and growth. The guide positions Vantage as the most comprehensive option, citing its broad cloud and SaaS integrations, custom business metrics, virtual tagging, cost allocation, automated optimization, reporting, anomaly detection, and enterprise governance capabilities. Other tools serve more specialized roles: Datadog links cost data with observability telemetry, Harness combines cost management with software delivery workflows, Kubecost provides granular Kubernetes allocation, Ternary focuses on Google Cloud cost analysis, Anodot emphasizes anomaly detection, and AWS Cost Explorer offers basic AWS-only cost filtering and grouping. The comparison concludes that effective unit-cost platforms should accurately allocate shared costs, incorporate real business telemetry, support custom metrics, and provide visibility beyond standard cloud spending dashboards.

In the second session of FinOps Summer Camp, Make.com's Lukáš Pokorný and Martin Cangár discussed their approach to building AI cost observability using Vantage, in collaboration with Vantage CEO Ben Schaechter. As Make.com's AI usage and associated costs surged 8.7 times in the first half of the year, traditional methods like spreadsheets became inadequate, necessitating a unified view of AI spending through Vantage's integration with providers like Anthropic, OpenAI, and AWS Bedrock. They emphasized the importance of consolidating AI bills for visibility, standardizing attribution across different providers to simplify cost management, and focusing on behavior metrics such as aborted requests to assess AI adoption quality. By integrating AI budget insights directly into developers' daily tools like Backstage, Make.com aims to facilitate informed decision-making without hindering AI adoption, underscoring the role of timely data in catching cost spikes promptly. The session highlighted the need for engineering teams to centralize cost data, standardize attribution, and set up immediate alerts to enable better decision-making as AI scales, with future sessions set to explore AI budget management strategies further.

AWS Savings Plans can substantially reduce compute costs, but organizations must balance maximizing coverage against the risk of overcommitting to long-term capacity that may go unused. The comparison reviews Vantage, ProsperOps, AWS Cost Explorer, Spot by NetApp, Zesty, and Usage.ai, assessing their coverage analysis, automated purchasing, commitment management, and integration with broader cloud-cost practices. Vantage is presented as a comprehensive FinOps platform with Autopilot-driven Savings Plan purchasing, cost recommendations, waste remediation, anomaly detection, and integrations across multiple cloud and software services. ProsperOps and Usage.ai emphasize hands-off commitment automation, while AWS Cost Explorer provides AWS-native recommendations and utilization reporting but may be less suitable for complex environments. Spot by NetApp combines commitment planning with workload-aware infrastructure automation, and Zesty seeks to reduce risk through incremental adjustments to Reserved Instance and Savings Plan portfolios. The comparison concludes that effective Savings Plan management depends on strong analysis, sophisticated automation, overcommitment controls, and broader visibility into cloud spending and governance.

Vantage has introduced a new feature in its Cost Reports called Count, which allows users to track the number of distinct infrastructure resources, services, models, or seats used over time, enhancing visibility into the scaling of underlying infrastructure. This new option, added alongside existing Cost and Usage views, enables users to set a report's Y-Axis to Count, providing insights into trends and helping to explain cost trends by showing how many distinct items were running during a specific period. Previously, customers had to export and manipulate data outside of Vantage to get such insights, but now they can easily visualize these trends directly within the Vantage console or access them programmatically via the /costs API. This feature is beneficial for FinOps practitioners, platform teams, and engineering leaders who need to monitor resource sprawl, AI/LLM adoption, and SaaS seat growth, and it comes at no additional cost to existing Vantage customers. Users can leverage this Count feature in various reports and integrate it with tools like Canvas and dashboards, allowing for a comprehensive analysis of their cloud environments over time.

In an increasingly complex landscape of cloud spending across various providers, AI services, and SaaS platforms, the need for advanced cloud cost reporting tools has become crucial for finance and engineering leaders. These tools offer polished, actionable reports tailored to different stakeholders, whether through executive dashboards, Slack or Teams delivery, or scheduled insights. Vantage emerges as the most comprehensive solution, providing deep multi-cloud visibility with over 30 integrations and features like hierarchical cost allocation and anomaly detection, making it suitable for diverse reporting needs. While AWS Cost Explorer and Azure Cost Management offer native solutions for AWS and Azure users respectively, they lack multi-cloud capabilities and native Slack or Teams integrations. Datadog integrates cost management with performance metrics, focusing on engineering context, while Kubecost specializes in Kubernetes-specific reporting. Harness and Infracost provide additional perspectives on cloud cost management, with Harness integrating into its CI/CD platform and Infracost offering pre-deployment cost visibility. Ultimately, selecting the right tool depends on factors like dashboard customization, integration breadth, and delivery capabilities, with Vantage leading as the most flexible and robust option for comprehensive cloud cost reporting.

Vantage has introduced Scenario Model Forecasting, a feature that allows enterprise customers to create detailed forecasts of future cloud spending by defining Scenario Models that consider known future costs, credits, and trends. This capability enables users to model the financial impact of anticipated business changes, such as infrastructure upgrades or seasonal events, on their cloud expenditures. By using the new "Scenario Models" section within Financial Planning, customers can customize forecasts by specifying cost adjustments, priorities, and service filters to refine their projections. These Scenario Models can be integrated with Vantage's machine-learning forecasting model, allowing users to generate multiple Custom Forecasts from the Forecasts tab in any Cost Report. This approach helps users to not only incorporate historical data trends but also account for future initiatives that are independent of past usage patterns, offering a more precise and tailored financial outlook for cloud resources.

Cloud budgeting is a critical challenge for FinOps teams due to the fluctuating nature of cloud infrastructure costs, which makes accurate budgeting essential for financial accountability. This text compares various cloud budgeting tools, highlighting key features such as budget creation, spend forecasting, and alert configurations. Vantage is noted as the leading tool for FinOps teams, offering comprehensive multi-cloud visibility, hierarchical budgeting, and robust integrations with over 30 providers, making it ideal for organizations seeking granular financial controls. Other tools like AWS Cost Explorer, Azure Cost Management, Harness, Kubecost, and CoreStack are discussed for their unique functionalities and suitability to different organizational needs, ranging from basic budget management to compliance-focused governance. These tools aim to bring cost ownership and financial discipline to cloud operations by aligning budgets with organizational structures and providing seamless integration with diverse cloud services.

Effective management of Google Cloud Platform (GCP) costs is crucial for organizations as expenses can rapidly increase across various services like BigQuery, Compute Engine, and GKE clusters. This overview compares several cost management tools tailored for GCP, each offering varied capabilities in areas such as Google Cloud visibility, BigQuery cost analysis, and committed use discount management. Vantage is highlighted as the most comprehensive option, providing in-depth cost breakdowns, virtual tagging for financial teams, and integration with over 30 providers, making it suitable for enterprises seeking multi-cloud support and advanced governance. Other tools like Google Cloud's native cost management console, Ternary, Datadog, Economize, Kubecost, and CoreStack offer specific strengths, from foundational visibility to specialized Kubernetes cost allocation, catering to different organizational needs and scales. The right choice depends on the required depth of cloud visibility, multi-project allocation capabilities, and whether integration with broader cloud operations is necessary.

In 2026, the landscape of cloud and AI cost management is undergoing significant changes, as discussed in the FinOps Summer Camp webinar featuring insights from Ben Schaechter, CEO of Vantage, and Jean Atelsek, a senior analyst at 451 Research by S&P Global. First-party cost management tools from major cloud providers like AWS, Google Cloud, and Azure remain popular, but there is an increasing shift towards vendor-agnostic solutions due to their comprehensive cross-platform capabilities. The integration of FinOps with adjacent management tools, including observability, is growing, driven by the need to track AI costs, which have become a substantial part of many organizations' budgets. GenAI-related expenditures were the primary cause of budget overspending in 2025, with companies now dedicating significant resources to managing AI spend. The proliferation of AI providers has led to a surge in infrastructure costs, prompting enterprises to adopt third-party tools for better cost attribution and governance, highlighting the evolving nature of cost management in the AI era.

Vantage has introduced support for Baseten cost and usage data, enabling customers to track AI inference, training, and Model API costs directly within the Vantage platform. This integration allows users to monitor their spending by product line, model deployment, instance type, and environment, alongside their broader cloud infrastructure on providers like AWS, Azure, and GCP. With the new feature, Vantage automatically ingests data from Baseten via an API key, eliminating the need for manual data exports. Customers can use Cost Reports to view Baseten expenses in conjunction with other cloud costs, apply Virtual Tags for cost allocation, and configure budgets and anomaly detection. The integration is available to all Vantage customers without additional fees, although it may affect quota tier enforcement if Baseten costs exceed current limits. The detailed usage data is refreshed daily in the Vantage console, providing historical cost attribution even for deleted or torn-down deployments.

Enterprise cloud cost management tools are essential for organizations facing the complexities of scaling cloud environments across numerous accounts, providers, and engineers, with a need for governance, security, and compliance. These tools are evaluated based on their SOC 2 compliance, single sign-on, role-based access control, and their ability to integrate with existing identity and access management systems. Vantage is highlighted as a leading platform due to its comprehensive multi-cloud integration, automated optimization features, and developer-friendly tools, making it suitable for large engineering teams. CoreStack focuses on governance and compliance, ServiceNow extends its IT asset management capabilities to cloud environments, Densify uses machine learning for resource optimization, Spot by NetApp automates infrastructure management, Harness integrates cost management with DevOps workflows, and Kubecost specializes in Kubernetes cost monitoring. The choice of tool depends on factors beyond cost dashboards, emphasizing security, scalability, and integration to manage cloud costs effectively within enterprise settings.

Vantage has introduced Business Metric Calculations, a feature that enhances the ability to apply business metrics to Cost Reports with three new calculation modes: gross margin, usage unit economics, and raw metric overlay, alongside the existing unit cost calculation. This innovation allows users, particularly in engineering and finance, to visualize and analyze infrastructure spending in relation to revenue and operational data without needing to export data for manual analysis. The new calculation modes enable a more comprehensive understanding of financial metrics, such as whether cloud spending is affecting gross margins or how efficiently an AI platform uses resources. All calculations are presented on a secondary axis consistent with current unit cost displays, providing a multi-perspective view of infrastructure costs. This feature is available at no additional cost to all Vantage customers with configured business metrics, and users can select their preferred calculation type through a new dropdown in cost reports, with API support available for automation and integration purposes.

As cloud infrastructure becomes increasingly complex with multi-cloud operations, AI deployments, and numerous SaaS services, the importance of efficient cloud cost management tools has surged, addressing the challenges of spiraling expenses and the need for transparency. The text explores various cloud cost management solutions, highlighting the capabilities of tools like Vantage, which offers extensive multi-cloud visibility and automation features, AWS Cost Explorer for AWS-exclusive insights, Datadog's integration of cost management with observability, and Kubecost's focus on Kubernetes cost monitoring. It also discusses CastAI's Kubernetes optimization, Infracost's pre-deployment cost estimation, and Azure Cost Management's native Azure tracking capabilities. The evaluation emphasizes factors like integration breadth, cost allocation depth, optimization quality, and automation levels, with Vantage being recommended as the leading solution for comprehensive cost management and FinOps scalability.

Cloud cost optimization is crucial as cloud spending rises rapidly, impacting margins despite strong workload performance. Effective cost management requires visibility into expenses across multiple clouds and services, enabling organizations to make informed decisions. Key strategies include rightsizing resources, eliminating unused infrastructure, using commitment-based discounts, and fostering a culture of financial accountability. Automation plays a significant role, with platforms like Vantage offering comprehensive tools for continuous cost recommendations and autonomous waste elimination. Specialized solutions such as AWS Cost Explorer, CastAI, ProsperOps, Kubecost, Infracost, and StormForge address specific needs like Kubernetes optimization and commitment management. Overall, integrating visibility, automation, and financial discipline across teams is essential for maintaining performance and reliability while controlling cloud costs.

As cloud environments become more intricate due to the rise of AI workloads, organizations require FinOps platforms that provide comprehensive financial oversight beyond basic dashboards to manage cloud costs effectively. The discussed platforms are evaluated based on visibility, cost allocation, governance, and automation. Vantage emerges as the leading solution, offering extensive multi-cloud integrations, sophisticated cost allocation tools, enterprise-grade governance, and proactive automation features. Other platforms like Harness, Datadog, Kubecost, AWS Cost Explorer, CastAI, and CoreStack each cater to specific needs, such as Kubernetes cost management, regulatory compliance, or integration with existing ecosystems. However, Vantage is highlighted for its ability to support a mature FinOps practice suitable for both startups and large enterprises, making it a versatile choice for organizations seeking to optimize cloud spending efficiently.

As enterprise cloud environments become increasingly complex, the necessity for specialized FinOps software to manage governance, chargebacks, forecasting, and collaboration at scale becomes crucial. The text evaluates several top FinOps platforms, highlighting Vantage as a leading solution due to its extensive multi-cloud integrations, automated optimization features, and robust security capabilities, which make it ideal for large organizations needing comprehensive financial operations management. Other noteworthy platforms include Harness, which integrates cloud cost management with CI/CD pipelines; Kubecost, focused on Kubernetes cost monitoring; Datadog, which couples cost management with its observability tools; CoreStack, offering policy-driven cost management with a focus on compliance; and CastAI, specializing in automated Kubernetes optimization for cost reduction. Selecting the right FinOps software involves assessing each platform's ability to manage financial operations effectively while promoting collaboration among engineering, finance, and executive teams.

Vantage has announced new support for Modal cost and usage data, enabling customers to track serverless AI and ML compute expenses directly within Vantage. This integration allows automatic ingestion of Modal data, providing detailed insights into compute costs by app, function, environment, and GPU type. Customers can manage budgets, detect spending anomalies, and allocate costs alongside their broader cloud and AI infrastructure. The integration is available to all Vantage customers at no additional cost, requiring only an API token to connect Modal, and it supports viewing costs within Vantage's Cost Reports. This advancement simplifies the process for enterprises that previously had to manually export data from Modal for cost tracking.

As cloud environments become increasingly complex, organizations face challenges in optimizing infrastructure spending due to idle resources, oversized instances, and underutilized commitments. To address these issues, several cloud cost optimization tools have emerged, each offering unique capabilities. Vantage is highlighted as a leading platform, providing multi-cloud visibility, automated savings recommendations, and tools like the FinOps Agent for waste elimination. ProsperOps specializes in automating AWS commitment management, while CastAI focuses on Kubernetes workload optimization. Densify uses machine learning for rightsizing recommendations, and Spot by NetApp utilizes spot instances to manage costs. StormForge targets Kubernetes resource efficiency, and AWS Cost Explorer offers basic cost analysis for AWS users. When selecting a tool, organizations should consider factors such as continuous savings recommendations, automation capabilities, and the integration of cost data with business metrics, with Vantage noted for its comprehensive features.

Vantage has introduced an enhanced dashboard experience that allows users to customize their dashboards for better storytelling of cloud and AI cost data. The new features include resizable report widgets, the ability to add and format Free Text widgets directly within the dashboard, and an improved editor for modifying display settings like chart legends and widget titles. Previously, the process of adding or customizing widgets was cumbersome, requiring navigation away from the dashboard view, but the new updates streamline this by enabling changes directly on the dashboard. These enhancements are designed to help teams create intuitive layouts that highlight important data attributes and provide contextual information without unnecessary clutter. Available at no additional cost, the updated dashboard is meant to aid Vantage customers in effectively sharing narratives with stakeholders such as finance partners and executives, though certain features like Free Text widgets are not included in PDF exports.

As organizations expand their use of multiple cloud providers and services, cloud cost management platforms become essential to track, allocate, and report on expenses effectively. This guide evaluates several platforms, including Vantage, Datadog, CoreStack, and Harness, focusing on their multi-cloud support, cost allocation, and reporting capabilities. Vantage excels with its wide range of integrations and features such as virtual tagging and automated cost optimization, making it ideal for businesses focused on managing costs at scale. Datadog integrates cost management with its observability tools, offering insights into the financial impact of resource use, though it may lack some specialized FinOps features. CoreStack emphasizes compliance and policy-driven management, making it suitable for regulated industries, while Harness focuses on developer-centric workflows and CI/CD pipeline integration. The guide concludes that the most effective platforms provide comprehensive multi-cloud integration, flexible cost allocation, and detailed reporting that ties spending to business outcomes.

Vantage has introduced a new feature allowing customers to natively import business metrics from Snowflake, a data warehouse, into its platform. This development enables users to write SQL queries against their Snowflake warehouse, with the resulting data being ingested as business metrics on a recurring basis. These metrics can be used for detailed cost analysis and allocation, such as determining unit costs in cost reports or defining business metric allocations for virtual tags. This integration simplifies the process for users who previously had to export data manually or build custom pipelines, reducing lag and engineering overhead. The feature is available to all Vantage customers with a connected Snowflake integration, providing a streamlined method for incorporating operational metrics into financial planning.

Vantage has introduced support for tracking ElevenLabs voice generation costs and usage within its platform, allowing users to integrate ElevenLabs data using an API key for better visibility and management of expenditures. This integration enables customers to monitor credit consumption by voice and model, set budgets, detect spending anomalies, and allocate AI voice costs alongside other cloud infrastructure costs. Previously, users had to rely on manual exports or custom scripts to track these expenses, but now Vantage automates the ingestion and display of detailed usage and cost data from ElevenLabs, categorized by voice, model, and product type. This enhancement provides a consolidated view of ElevenLabs expenses within the broader AI and cloud infrastructure spend, and the integration is available to all Vantage customers without additional fees, although ElevenLabs costs are included in quota tier enforcement.

Cloud cost management software platforms are essential tools for organizations to maintain visibility, budgeting, and optimization of their expenditures across cloud providers like AWS, Azure, and GCP. As infrastructure scales, effectively managing cloud costs becomes a significant challenge, prompting the need for specialized platforms. The text compares leading platforms such as Vantage, which offers extensive integration and automation features, AWS Cost Explorer for AWS-exclusive environments, and Datadog, known for its observability capabilities tied to cost management. Kubecost and CastAI focus on Kubernetes environments, providing specific insights and optimization for containerized workloads. Harness integrates cloud cost management into CI/CD workflows, and Azure Cost Management provides native tools for Azure users. Each platform offers unique features, with Vantage highlighted for its comprehensive multi-cloud coverage and intelligent automation, addressing the needs of diverse stakeholders from engineers to financial leaders.

Vantage and Metronome have partnered to provide companies with a unified platform for analyzing revenue, usage, and cost data, enhancing their ability to optimize margins and make informed pricing decisions. This integration allows joint customers to synchronize Metronome's revenue and product usage data into Vantage for comprehensive margin analysis and pricing strategy development. Customers can view customer-specific gross margins, receive alerts on unprofitable usage, forecast revenue and costs, and calculate unit economics. The integration supports daily updates of business metrics, facilitating enhanced visibility and decision-making without any additional cost, though it does not involve sending cost data back to Metronome. This collaboration aims to aid businesses in navigating fluctuating AI, cloud, and SaaS costs while improving pricing and packaging strategies based on detailed financial insights.

Vantage has expanded its Anthropic integration to support Claude Enterprise costs, allowing enterprises to track spending and usage across various Claude products such as Claude Code, Cowork, Chat, and more. This new feature ingests daily per-user cost and consumption data from the Claude Enterprise Analytics API, providing detailed cost reports that can be filtered by product, model, user, region, and other dimensions. Previously, Vantage's integration only covered direct API calls, leaving subscription-based expenditures untracked. With this update, Claude Enterprise customers can now view their costs and usage of Claude products alongside other AI and infrastructure expenses, facilitating better financial oversight and optimization. The integration is available at no additional charge for existing Claude Enterprise plan customers, although exceeding quota limits may require an upgrade.