Larry Ellison facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Larry Ellison
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Ellison in 2016
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| Born |
Lawrence Joseph Ellison
August 17, 1944 New York City, U.S.
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| Title | Co-founder, executive chairman and CTO of Oracle Corporation |
| Spouse(s) |
Adda Quinn
(m. 1967; div. 1974)Nancy Wheeler Jenkins
(m. 1977; div. 1978)Barbara Boothe
(m. 1983; div. 1986)Melanie Craft
(m. 2003; div. 2010)Nikita Kahn
(div. 2020)Jolin (Keren) Zhu
(m. 2023) |
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Lawrence Joseph Ellison (born August 17, 1944) is an American businessman who helped start the software company Oracle Corporation. He was the main leader of Oracle from 1977 to 2014. Today, he is the company's chief technology officer and executive chairman.
Larry Ellison is one of the richest people in the world. As of July 2025, he is the second-wealthiest person globally, with a huge net worth. He is also famous for owning most of Lānaʻi, which is the sixth-largest island in Hawaii.
Contents
Early Life and School
Larry Ellison was born on August 17, 1944, in New York City. When he was nine months old, he got very sick. His mother then gave him to her aunt and uncle, who adopted him. He didn't meet his birth mother again until he was 48 years old.
He grew up in Chicago. His adoptive mother, Lillian Spellman Ellison, was kind and loving. His adoptive father, Louis Ellison, was a government worker who had once been wealthy but lost his money during the Great Depression.
Larry Ellison went to South Shore High School in Chicago. Later, he studied at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign to become a doctor. He was even named science student of the year there. However, he left college after his second year because his adoptive mother passed away.
After spending some time in California, he went to the University of Chicago for one term. There, he studied physics and math, and this is where he first learned about computer design. He then moved to Berkeley, California, and started his career as a computer programmer.
Starting Oracle Corporation
In the 1970s, Larry Ellison worked for a company called Ampex Corporation. One of his first projects was to build a database for the CIA, which was secretly called "Oracle." This project gave him the idea for his future company.
Ellison was inspired by a paper about how to organize large amounts of data using a "relational database system." In 1977, he started a company called Software Development Laboratories (SDL) with two friends. They invested $2,000, and Larry put in $1,200 of that money.
Even though Larry was good with technology, his partners were even stronger in that area. So, they decided he would be in charge of sales.
Growing the Company
In 1979, the company changed its name to Relational Software, Inc. (RSI). Larry wanted their database to work well with a system from IBM, but IBM wouldn't share the information needed.
The first version of their database, released in 1979, was called Oracle version 2. There was no version 1. In 1983, the company officially became Oracle Systems Corporation, named after its main product.
In 1990, Oracle faced a tough time and had to let go of about 10% of its employees. This happened because their sales team was encouraging customers to buy too much software at once. They would count future sales as current income, which caused problems when those sales didn't happen. Oracle had to fix their financial reports, and Larry later called it "an incredible business mistake."
Competition and Success
At that time, IBM was the main company for large database systems. But they were slow to offer databases for smaller computers using Unix and Windows. This gave other companies like Sybase, Oracle, and Microsoft a chance to grow.
For a while, Sybase was growing faster than Oracle. However, Sybase later lost its focus. This allowed Oracle to become a leader in the database industry.
In his early years at Oracle, Larry Ellison was recognized for his achievements. He received an award in the High Technology Category for the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Program.
In 1994, another company called Informix became Oracle's main competitor. There was a big rivalry between Informix's CEO and Larry Ellison. Eventually, Informix ran into financial trouble, and IBM bought them in 2001.
After beating its rivals, Oracle became very successful. However, Microsoft's SQL Server and IBM's DB2 database later became strong competitors. As of 2013, Oracle's main competition for new database licenses came from IBM's DB2 and Microsoft SQL Server.
In 2005, Larry Ellison agreed to donate $100 million to charity in Oracle's name to settle a lawsuit.
Larry Ellison has earned a lot of money from Oracle. In 2009, he decided to take only $1 for his base salary for the next year, down from $1,000,000.
Recent Years at Oracle
In 2010, the European Union approved Oracle's purchase of Sun Microsystems. This deal helped Oracle grow and create new products. It also gave Oracle control of the popular MySQL database.
In 2014, Larry Ellison changed his role at Oracle. He appointed Mark Hurd and Safra Catz as co-CEOs. Larry himself became the chief technology officer and executive chairman.
In 2016, Oracle bought a company called NetSuite for $9.3 billion. Larry Ellison owned a large part of NetSuite, so this sale made him personally $3.5 billion richer.
In 2018, Larry Ellison joined the board of directors for Tesla, Inc., after buying many shares in the company. He left the Tesla Board in 2022.
As of June 2020, Larry Ellison was the seventh wealthiest person in the world. By 2022, he owned 42.9 percent of Oracle Corporation's shares.
Other Activities
Larry Ellison has supported many different projects and causes.
In 1992, he broke his elbow in a bike accident. After getting treatment, he donated $5 million to start a research center for bones and muscles at the University of California, Davis.
He has also made large donations to Stanford University. In 2010, he signed "The Giving Pledge," promising to give away most of his wealth to charity. In 2016, he donated $200 million to the University of Southern California to create a cancer research center. This center was later renamed the Ellison Institute of Technology.
In 2023, his foundation gave over £52 million to the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.
Planes and Boats
Larry Ellison is a licensed pilot and owns several aircraft. He has even owned military jets, though the US government did not allow him to import a Soviet fighter jet he bought.
He is also very involved in yachting. He used to own one of the world's largest yachts, called Rising Sun, but he later sold his share. He now owns a smaller yacht called Musashi.
Ellison competes in yacht races with his team, Oracle Team USA. His team won the 33rd America's Cup in 2010, bringing the trophy back to America for the first time since 1995. In 2013, Oracle Team USA won the 34th America's Cup in San Francisco Bay. They made an amazing comeback, winning 9-8 after being behind 1-8.
In 2019, Ellison helped start the SailGP international racing series, which uses very fast boats called F50 foiling catamarans.
Other Ventures
In 2010, Larry Ellison made a short appearance in the movie Iron Man 2.
In 2013, he opened a restaurant in Malibu called Nikita, which closed in 2014.
In 2017, Ellison started a farming company called Sensei Ag. The company aims to use technology like AI and robots to change how food is grown around the world.
In 2009, Ellison bought the Indian Wells Tennis Garden facility and the Indian Wells Masters tennis tournament for $100 million. He has invested even more money into the club since then.
Political Involvement
Larry Ellison has been involved in politics, donating to both Democratic and Republican politicians.
In 2020, he allowed former president Donald Trump to hold a fundraiser at his estate in California. In 2022, he made a very large donation of $15 million to a political group supporting Senator Tim Scott.
In January 2025, Ellison joined other tech leaders at the White House to announce a project called The Stargate Project.
Support for Archaeology and Links with Benjamin Netanyahu
Larry Ellison has helped fund an archaeological dig in East Jerusalem. This project has received some criticism.
Reports in 2021 also said that Ellison offered Benjamin Netanyahu, a former Israeli Prime Minister, a job at Oracle.
Awards and Recognition
Larry Ellison has received several awards for his work:
- In 1997, he received the Golden Plate Award from the American Academy of Achievement.
- In 2013, he was added to the Bay Area Business Hall of Fame.
- In 2019, the Lawrence J. Ellison Institute for Transformative Medicine of USC honored him with the first Rebels With A Cause Award.
- In 2024, Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Personal Life
Marriages
Larry Ellison has been married six times:
- He married Adda Quinn in 1967, and they divorced in 1974.
- He married Nancy Wheeler Jenkins in 1976, and they divorced in 1978.
- He was married to Barbara Boothe from 1983 to 1986. They had two children, David and Megan, who are both film producers.
- On December 18, 2003, he married Melanie Craft, a writer. His friend Steve Jobs, who co-founded Apple, was the wedding photographer. They divorced in 2010.
- From 2010 to 2020, he was in a relationship and then married to Nikita Kahn. They divorced in 2020.
- As of 2024, Larry Ellison is married to Jolin Ellison.
Cars
Larry Ellison owns many special cars, including an Audi R8 and a McLaren F1. He especially likes the Acura NSX, which he used to give as gifts. He also reportedly owns a Lexus LFA.
Homes
Larry Ellison owns many impressive homes. His estate in Woodside, California, which cost about $110 million, is designed like a traditional Japanese village. It even has a man-made lake.
He has also bought many properties in Malibu, California, worth over $180 million. In 2010, he bought the historic Astors' Beechwood Mansion in Newport, Rhode Island.
In 2011, he purchased the Porcupine Creek Estate in Rancho Mirage, California, which includes a private golf course.
In December 2020, he moved from California to Lānaʻi, the Hawaiian island where he owns 98% of the land.
In 2022, Ellison bought a large property in Manalapan, Florida, for $173 million. This was the most expensive home purchase in Florida's history at the time.
See also
In Spanish: Larry Ellison para niños
- Ellison Medical Foundation
