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Since his mother was still a teenager, Lawrence was adopted by relatives of Russian origin. He grew up in Chicago with Lillian and Louis Ellison. After high school, Ellison enrolled at the University of Illinois, where he excelled in science. As a result of the death of his adoptive mother, which he found difficult to get over, Ellison dropped out of college. Ellison went to California, where he rediscovered the computer skills he had developed in high school. In San Francisco he began developing the computer system for a bank.
Further jobs as a programmer in Silicon Valley followed. Ellison joined the Californian company Amdahl Inc. in 1967. where he worked until 1971. He then served as President of "Omex Corporation, Systems Div." until 1977. Here he developed, among other things: for the CIA a complex database system that operated under the secret code "Oracle". Ellison named his own company after him, the "Oracle Corporation", which he founded in California in 1977 with Bob Miner. Ellison initially headed Oracle as President and, since 1978, as Chief Executive Officer. The "Oracle" developed database systems for the CIA and the US Air Force.
The software company specialized in the development and offering of infrastructure and application systems for business customers. Ellison expanded Oracle's sales in the following years to such an extent that it became the second largest software manufacturer in the world. The company became the market leader in the field of software for databases. Due to its target audience in the business customer sector, Ellison came into competition with the market-dominating "SAP" early on. While the German software company focuses on developing country-specific application systems for business customers, the Californian company is trying to offer corresponding software that can be used globally and to gain market leadership in Internet applications.
The competitive situation with Bill Gates' Microsoft company also prompted Ellison to strategically expand his product range. Since the mid-1990s he has been involved in the development of a new computer system: The Network Computer (NC) aimed to simplify the handling of application software compared to the PC. In 1996, Ellison founded Knowledge Universe, which produces educational software for children and families. However, the first NC series device, which came out in 1997, did not bring "Oracle" the desired business success. In the same year, a takeover of the ailing Apple company that Ellison was considering failed after his best friend Steven Jobs was appointed to restructure Apple.
After all, in 1997, "Oracle" participated together with Microsoft in the restructuring of "Apple Computer Inc.", on whose board Ellison joined. Under his influence, Apple began preparing the development of an NC model in 1998. In addition to computer technology, Larry Ellison was active in sailing, where he had already completed several races. He also flies his own Italian-made fighter jet. The passionate sailor and pilot founded the Oracle Racing team in May 2000. On July 8, 2002, Oracle announced its collaboration with BMW. The team now started as the Oracle-BMW Racing Team. In 2002, "Oracle" was one of the largest software companies in the world with sales of $9.7 billion and 42,000 employees.
In 2003, Ellison went public with a sensational takeover bid against competitor PeopleSoft, which he wanted to buy for $5.1 billion. The financially strong capital entrepreneur is relying on the concentration process that he sees taking place in the industry in the next few years in favor of the very large companies - which of course also includes "Oracle". In the meantime, Ellison has made no secret of his economic success: for a three-digit million sum, he had a private country estate built in California based on the historical model of a Japanese village from the 16th century.
In 2004, Ellison ranked 12th among the richest people in the world with a fortune of 18.7 billion US dollars. In 2008, the American magazine Forbes published the ranking of the richest people in the world: According to this, Ellison was ranked 14th with 25 billion US dollars.
