By Hiran de Silva
For too long, Excel has been misunderstood.
ERP vendors call it Excel Hell.
Cloud startups promise to replace it.
Even some Excel influencers quietly accept that Excel can’t scale.
They’re wrong.
Badly wrong.
Because when Excel is used as it was truly designed —
as a client connected to its own built-in relational database (the ACE engine) —
it performs miracles.
Excel stops being a static file.
It becomes a live, enterprise-grade system — a Digital Librarian for your business.
And that’s not theory.
It’s proven, time and again, in the real world.
When the Giants Failed, Excel Delivered
At Travelport, JD Edwards failed to deliver.
IT couldn’t build the architecture we needed.
Excel did.
At Edexcel, Oracle Financials couldn’t meet management’s needs.
I was called back — and Excel succeeded where Oracle couldn’t.
At ProWeb, the project collapsed because the system couldn’t even distinguish between a “G” and a “6.”
Excel stepped in, and the problem disappeared.
At Informa PLC, the SAP BPC project was scrapped.
Excel took over — faster, cheaper, and far more flexible.
Same pattern.
Same result.
The miracle of Excel — working beautifully where multimillion-pound systems failed.
Why You’ve Never Heard This
Because the miracle has been suppressed.
For over a decade, there’s been a quiet effort to keep this truth out of view.
Excel can already create a central relational data model — in seconds.
It can already be the live, collaborative platform everyone’s been dreaming about.
But that’s not good for business — not their business.
ERP vendors, Power Platform evangelists, and even some MVPs have a vested interest in selling you the idea that Excel is broken.
It isn’t.
It’s just under-taught, under-imagined, and underestimated.
To My Fellow Excel Professionals
Some will say I’m being hostile.
That by comparing my solutions with theirs —
like the Christmas Expenses example or Mark Proctor’s account reconciliation —
I’m attacking them.
I’m not.
This isn’t hostility.
It’s clarity.
I’m challenging a mindset — not people.
The mindset that treats Excel as a box, not as a platform.
Literal thinking says: “That’s impossible in Excel.”
Lateral thinking says: “Show me the architecture.”
When I demonstrate that a missing credit entry completes the story, or that a hub-and-spoke model eliminates broken links, I’m not tearing anyone down.
I’m showing what Excel can do when we think beyond the workbook.
Where Were the Experts?
When the Wall Street Journal ran its anti-Excel articles in 2017, 2021, and 2022,
not one major Excel voice said:
“Wait — Excel can already do this through a relational backend.”
Not one.
The Institute of Chartered Accountants said nothing either.
Meanwhile, Microsoft promoted Power Platform, Fabric, and Dataverse — tools locked behind IT departments and license walls.
The biggest problem in business technology remains the same as it was in the 1990s:
user empowerment.
The miracle of Excel is that it empowers you — the business user.
No tickets. No queues. No delays.
Just a living, breathing system in your hands.
How the Truth Gets Suppressed
I’ve seen this pattern again and again.
1. Clear Plan (Adaptive Planning reseller, London)
Their MD said to me: “You clearly know what Excel can do — but the audience doesn’t.”
In other words: they sell “Excel replacements” because their audience doesn’t know Excel’s true power.
2. Colin Wall (Anaplan)
Admitted that their customers simply don’t know Excel can already do what Anaplan promises.
3. Mark Proctor
Recognises that my budgeting method is powerful — but believes only I can do it.
He doesn’t realise Excel can create a relational database with one click.
These are smart, capable people.
But they’re caught in a system that profits from not teaching the full truth.
The Real Opportunity
The biggest opportunity in Excel’s history is now right in front of us:
The transformation of Excel into a smooth-running enterprise process platform.
Not Power Query batch processing.
Not one-size-fits-all cloud subscriptions.
Not endless IT bottlenecks.
Just Excel — connected to its own Digital Librarian, sharing live data between users, sites, and departments.
Budget consolidation? Solved.
Reconciliations? Solved.
Inventory, forecasting, and reporting? Solved.
Not with patches.
With architecture.
A Challenge to the Community
If anyone can build a better live, two-way, multi-user budgeting system inside Excel — show me.
Let’s compare it.
Side by side.
Functionally.
Honestly.
Because so far, no one has.
Not the YouTubers.
Not the MVPs.
Not the vendors.
Not even the Institute that trains accountants to live inside spreadsheets.
They all talk about Excel’s problems.
I talk about its potential.
Excel Fights Back
This isn’t about me.
It’s about the truth.
Excel doesn’t need to be replaced.
It needs to be understood.
It’s already a client-server system.
It already has its own relational engine.
It already delivers what billion-dollar platforms promise.
The miracle of Excel is real.
But it’s been buried under noise, vested interests, and surface-level tutorials.
Now it’s time to bring it back.
Because this time —
Excel fights back!
And this time it wins.
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