Spreadsheet and data solutions provider Sourcetable launched a “self-driving” spreadsheet that allows users to simply tell the spreadsheet what they want done through natural language commands.
Sourcetable developed the solution as a way to bring advanced spreadsheet functionality to people who might struggle with basic functions like VLOOKUP or creating a pivot table. The “self-driving” autopilot capabilities give the AI complete write access and edit control to complete multi-step operations.
“AI is the biggest platform shift since the browser, with a bigger opportunity for disruption,” said Sourcetable CEO and co-founder Eoin McMillan. “Sourcetable is building the AI spreadsheet for the next billion users, be they human or AI. As AI makes analysis easier, everybody will become an analyst. Sourcetable’s AI automation ushers in a new era of productivity and human cognition.”
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Sourcetable’s autopilot mode can complete a wide range of complex tasks, including creating and editing financial models, generating spreadsheet templates, building pivot tables, cleaning data, creating charts and graphs, editing formatting, enriching data and analyzing entire workbooks. The AI can understand data context without requiring users to pre-select ranges, interpret multiple ranges across different tabs, work with messy data, and seek human clarification when instructions are unclear.
The AI is capable of accessing anything that is publicly available on the internet, McMillan said in an email, and it can also extract data from URLs if instructed to do so. This includes Federal Reserve Economic Data, stock ticks and trading data, Yahoo finance, futures, geopolitics, market sentiment, macroeconomic analyses, Wikipedia data and much more. “There’s even a full fund manager Easter egg included in this release,” he added.
This ability to access tools outside itself also means that users, via a virtual machine with hundreds of libraries and AI tools available, can ask the autopilot to find a more advanced tool to serve their needs by requesting the system to “download data” or “use Python” to solve a task. McMillan said Sourcetable plans to make this feature more user-friendly in the future as the technology ultimately moves toward becoming a full agentic platform and operating system.
To discourage the AI from providing false information, the solution is built around a code-driven evaluation loop developed internally that verifies AI response in real time. Without this foundation, according to Sourcetable, self-driving spreadsheet automation would be too slow and unreliable to be trusted. McMillan said the company uses a combination of techniques to optimize results while minimizing latency. First, there’s AI-driven process supervision of inputs, outputs and prompts, effectively AI watching AI. This is combined with a code-driven audit of quantitative outputs (e.g., Python, SQL and spreadsheet output evaluation) and, finally, thought-driven techniques (e.g., Chain of Thought Reasoning and Deliberate Reasoning) to drive better results, particularly for multi-step processes.
The new solution uses not one but many models to deliver results. While certain companies are locked into their own proprietary AI models, Sourcetable’s AI selects the optimal model for each task–including OpenAI, Anthropic, Groq, Meta (Llama), Nvidia, Prior Labs, DeepSeek and Hugging Face—and even combines multiple models for better results. McMillan explained that different models are better suited to different tasks and run better on different kinds of hardware. For example, he noted, Claude is currently best at coding, TabPFN at interpreting tabular data, Groq at fast inference, etc. Sourcetable’s AI knows model specifications and strengths, so i’s able to understand what a user is trying to do and find the best tool for it.
While accessing public models can sometimes come with a per-prompt cost, McMillan said the company has established relationships with many service providers to ensure high rate limits and the ability to handle a large number of requests. He added that, right now, Sourcetable use a combination of manual and automated controls to prevent abuse of the system that could conceivably create large fees, though he believes the long-term cost curve indicates that AI will essentially become free, with the price of software being more aligned with value than cost of goods sold.
Prior to this release, Sourcetable did offer an AI copilot similar to many in the market that was more for formula assistance, charting and answering questions, according to McMillan. This was initially included as a SQL assistant to retrieve database data to help users who didn’t know how to write SQL, and this is how the company learned that users really wanted to use the AI for their regular spreadsheet workflows, leading Sourcetable to develop this current solution.
“Ironically, solving the database retrieval problems forced us to build our own Chain of Thought equivalent before OpenAI released theirs publicly,” said McMillan. “That taught us how to leverage processes like CoT for multistep processes and automation, and this gave us a big head start once we shifted gears toward full spreadsheet automation via AI. Today’s autopilot moves us from answering questions to thinking and agency. It’s a big leap forward.”
Sourcetable offers both a free tier and a pro tier, which costs $20 a month. All Sourcetable users get the first two weeks free on the Pro tier and can continue using the system on a rate-limited free tier. All the regular spreadsheet and charting features are free and unrestricted. McMillan added that Pro users are Sourcetable’s revenue source. Free tier users generate no revenue, he said, “although happy users spread the word, which is the best form of marketing.”
The House unanimously passed four bipartisan bills Tuesday concerning taxes and the Internal Revenue Service that were all endorsed this week by the American Institute of CPAs, and passed two others as well.
H.R. 1152, the Electronic Filing and Payment Fairness Act, sponsored by Rep. Darin LaHood, R-Illinois, Suzan Delbene, D-Washington, Randy Feenstra, R-Iowa, Brad Schneider, D-Illinois, Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pennsylvania and Jimmy Panetta, D-California. The bill would apply the “mailbox rule” to electronically submitted tax returns and payments to allow the IRS to record payments and documents submitted to the IRS electronically on the day the payments or documents are submitted instead of when they are received or reviewed at a later date. The AICPA believes this would offer clarity and simplification to the payment and document submission process while protecting taxpayers from undue penalties.
H.R. 998, the Internal Revenue Service Math and Taxpayer Help Act, sponsored by Rep. Randy Feenstra, R-Iowa, and Brad Schneider, D-Illinois, which would require notices describing a mathematical or clerical error to be made in plain language, and require the Treasury to provide additional procedures for requesting an abatement of a math or clerical error adjustment, including by telephone or in person, among other provisions.
H.R. 517, the Filing Relief for Natural Disasters Act, sponsored by Rep. David Kustoff, R-Tennessee, and Judy Chu, D-California. The process of receiving tax relief from the IRS following a natural disaster typically must follow a federal disaster declaration, which can often come weeks after a state disaster declaration. The bill would provide the IRS with authority to grant tax relief once the governor of a state declares either a disaster or a state of emergency and expand the mandatory federal filing extension under Section 7508(d) of the Tax Code from 60 days to 120 days, providing taxpayers with more time to file tax returns after a disaster.
H.R. 1491, the Disaster related Extension of Deadlines Act, sponsored by Rep. Gregory Murphy, R-North Carolina, and Jimmy Panetta, D-California, would extend the amount of time disaster victims would have to file for a tax refund or credit (i.e., the lookback period) by the amount of time afforded pursuant to a disaster relief postponement period for taxpayers affected by major disasters. This legislative solution would place taxpayers on equal footing as taxpayers not impacted by major disasters and would afford greater clarity and certainty to taxpayers and tax practitioners regarding this lookback period.
“The AICPA has long supported these proposals and will continue to work to advance comprehensive legislation that enhances IRS operations and improves the taxpayer experience,” said Melanie Lauridsen, vice president of tax policy and advocacy for the AICPA, in a statement Tuesday. “We are pleased to work closely with each of these Representatives on common-sense reforms that will benefit taxpayers, tax practitioners and tax administration and we’re encouraged by their passage in the House. We look forward to continuing to work with Congress to improve the taxpayer experience.”
The House also passed two other tax-related bills Tuesday that weren’t endorsed in the recent AICPA letter.
H.R. 1155, Recovery of Stolen Checks Act, sponsored by Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-New York, would require the IRS to create a process for taxpayers to request a replacement via direct deposit for a stolen paper check. If a check is determined to be stolen or lost, and not cashed, a taxpayer will receive a replacement check once the original check is cancelled, but many taxpayers are having their replacement checks stolen as well. Taxpayers who have a check stolen are then unable to request that the replacement check be sent via direct deposit. The bill would require the Treasury to establish processes and procedures under which taxpayers, who are otherwise eligible to receive an amount by paper check in replacement of a lost or stolen paper check, may elect to receive such amount by direct deposit.
H.R. 997, National Taxpayer Advocate Enhancement Act, sponsored by Rep. Randy Feenstra, R-Iowa, would prevent IRS interference with National Taxpayer Advocate personnel by granting the NTA responsibility for its attorneys. In advocating for taxpayer rights, the National Taxpayer Advocate often requires independent legal advice. But currently, the staff members hired by the National Taxpayer Advocate are accountable to internal IRS counsel, not the Taxpayer Advocate, creating a potential conflict of interest to the detriment of taxpayers. The bill would authorize the National Taxpayer Advocate to hire attorneys who report directly to her, helping establish independence from the IRS.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith, R-Missouri, applauded the bipartisan House passage of the various bills, which had been unanimously passed by the committee.
“President Trump was elected on the promise of finally making the government work better for working people,” Smith said in a statement Tuesday. “This bipartisan legislation helps fulfill that mandate and makes improvements to tax administration that will make it easier for the American people to file their taxes. Those who are rebuilding after a natural disaster particularly need help filing taxes, which is why this set of bills lightens the load for taxpayers in communities struck by a hurricane, tornado or some other disaster. With Tax Day just a few days away, we must look for common-sense, bipartisan ways to make filing taxes less of a hassle.”
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