Larry Ellison

At 79 years old, Larry Ellison has this physical status:

Early career and Oracle

Edgar F. Codd's study on relational database design for IBM influenced him while working at Ampex in the early 1970s. In 1977, a company that later became Oracle was born. Oracle became a top database consultant for mid- and low-range systems, later competing with Sybase (created 1984) and Microsoft SQL Server (a port of Sybase created in 1989), which later ranked Ellison as one of the world's richest individuals.

Ellison began working for Ampex Corporation in the 1970s, following a brief stint at Amdahl Corporation. Among his initiatives was a CIA database that he named "Oracle"; Ellison was inspired by a paper written by Edgar F. Codd entitled "A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks" by a researcher in New York. He founded Software Development Laboratories (SDL), which required two partners and an investment of $2,000; $1,200 of the funds was his.

Ellison had heard about the IBM System R database, which was also based on Codd's theories, and wanted Oracle to have compatibility with it, but IBM refused to divulge System R's code in 1979. Oracle version 2 was the first version of the Oracle Database in 1979; there was no Oracle version 1. After a successful flagship product in 1983, the corporation officially became Oracle Systems Corporation. Oracle laid off 10% of its employees (roughly 400 workers) in 1990 because it was losing money. This issue, which almost resulted in the company's bankruptcy, was caused by Oracle's "up-front" marketing approach, in which sales people encouraged prospective clients to buy the most appropriate amount of software at once. The salespeople then estimated the value of future license sales in the current quarter, thereby raising their compensation. When future sales came to an end, it became a problem. Oracle had to restate its income twice and had to resolve class action cases arising from the company's overstated earnings. Oracle had made "an amazing business mistake," Ellison would later claim.

Although IBM dominated the mainframe relational database market with its DB2 and SQL/DS database applications, it took a long time for IBM to develop a relational database for Unix and Windows operating systems. This left the door open to Sybase, Oracle, Informix, and then Microsoft, which would then dominate mid-range systems and microcomputers. Oracle fell behind Sybase at this time. Sybase, the first-growing database company and the database industry's darling vendor, was born from 1990 to 1993, but then it fell victim to merger mania. Sybase's 1996 merger with Powersoft resulted in a lack of attention on its main database technology. Sybase sold the rights to its database applications running under the Windows operating system to Microsoft Corporation in 1993, which now markets it under the name "SQL Server."

Ellison was named an Award Recipient in the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Program in his early years with Oracle.

Informix beat Sybase and became Oracle's most important competitor in 1994. Informix CEO Phil White and Ellison's epic struggle was front-page Silicon Valley news for three years. Informix revealed a significant revenue decline and earnings restatements in April 1997. Phil White was eventually sentenced to prison, and IBM bought Informix in 2001. Ellison was made a director of Apple Computers in 1997 after Steve Jobs returned to the company. Ellison resigned in 2002. Oracle enjoyed years of market dominance until the acquisition of Informix and Sybase in the late 1990s, and IBM's acquisition of Informix Software in 2001 to expand their DB2 database. IBM's DB2 and Microsoft SQL Server are Oracle's most popular databases for new database licenses on UNIX, Linux, and Windows operating systems as of 2013. IBM's DB2 dominates the mainframe database industry, with IBM's DB2 still dominating the mainframe database market.

Oracle Corporation gave Ellison a $975,000 salary, a $6,500,000 bonus, and other compensation of $955,100. Ellison received a total compensation of $61,180,524, which included a base salary of $1,000,000, a cash bonus of $8,369,000, and options valued at $50,087,100. He received a total compensation of $84,598,700, which included a base salary of $1,000,000, no stock grants, and options worth $71,372,000. He made $56.8 million in the year ending May 31, 2009. Forbes named him as the richest Californian in 2006, citing him as the best Californian. Oracle declared its intention to buy Sun Microsystems in April 2009, after a tug-of-war with IBM and Hewlett-Packard. Oracle's board granted Ellison another 7 million stock options on July 2, 2009, for the fourth year in a row. Ellison will be paid only $1 for his base salary for the 2010 fiscal year, down from the $1,000,000 he was paid in fiscal 2009.

The European Union accepted Oracle's takeover of Sun Microsystems on January 21, 2010. The European Union acknowledged that Oracle's acquisition of Sun Microsystems "has the ability to resurrect critical assets and produce new and innovative products." Oracle also obtained the Sun database, which Sun had acquired in 2008. Ellison wrote on August 9, 2010 blasted Hewlett-Packard's board for dismissing CEO Mark Hurd, arguing that "the HP board made the wrong decision since the idiots on the Apple board fired Steve Jobs many years ago." (Ellison and Hurd were close personal friends.) Oracle recruited Mark Hurd as co-president alongside Safra Catz on September 6. Ellison stayed in his current position at Oracle.

Ellison was ranked sixth richest individual in the world and third richest American in 2010, according to Forbes' estimated net worth of US$28 billion. Ellison was the best-paid executive in the last decade, according to the Wall Street Journal on July 27, 2010, who received a total compensation of US$1.84 billion. Ellison was ranked on Forbes' list of billionaires in September 2011 as the fifth richest man in the world and the third richest American with a net worth of about $36.5 billion. Ellison was once again on Forbes' list of billionaires in September 2012, behind Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, with a net worth of $44 billion. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, he came in second place in October 2012 behind David Hamilton Koch as the world's eighth richest individual. Ellison also has an interest in Salesforce.com, NetSuite, Quark Biotechnology Inc., and Astex Pharmaceuticals. Ellison agreed to purchase 98 percent of Lana'i's island from David Murdock's company, Castle & Cooke. The price was expected to be between $500 million and $600 million, according to reports. Ellison has decided to resolve a four-year-old insider trade case by promising to pay $100 million to charity in Oracle's name.

Ellison made $94.6 million in 2013, according to The Wall Street Journal, who wrote this article. Ellison appointed Mark Hurd to CEO of Oracle from his previous position as president on September 18, 2014; Safra Catz was also appointed CEO, transferring from her previous position as CFO to CEO. Ellison took over the roles of chief technology officer and executive chairman.

Oracle bought NetSuite for $9.3 billion in November 2016. Ellison was owned 35% of NetSuite at the time of the acquisition, earning him $3.5 billion per person.

Ellison was the fourth richest person in tech in 2017, according to Forbes.

According to Forbes, Ellison's net worth was $54.5 billion in June 2018.

Ellison became a director on Tesla's board in December 2018, after purchasing 3 million shares earlier this year. Ellison retired from the Tesla Board in August 2022.

Ellison holds 36.2% of Oracle Corporation's shares as of December 31, 2019, as well as 1.7% of Tesla's shares.

Ellison is expected to be the sixth richest person in the world as of June 2020, with a net worth of $66.8 billion.

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