7 ms·

Larry Ellison Will Step Down as CEO of Oracle, Will Remain as CTO

271 points by jhonovich 12y ago

joelrunyon 12y ago
Are there any more details into why he's doing this?
- mrcharles 12y ago
  Cause he's going to be CTO instead.
- andyl 12y ago
  Maybe it has something to do with him being 70?
  - valevk 12y ago
    Wow, I never knew that he is 70. I thought 40-something. But he looks really young. In this picture he is 69! [1] [1] http://www.channelweb.co.uk/IMG/834/272834/big-ellison.jpg http://www.channelweb.co.uk/IMG/834/272834/big-ellison.jpg
    - mhurron 12y ago
      > I thought 40-something You know Oracle was founded in the late 70's. And Ellison was a co-founder.
    - mrcarlosrendon 12y ago
      His face looks great. I think you can see his age in his arm skin.
      - laichzeit0 12y ago
        Well he's obviously had some "work done". Which I think is great, why not? Money is surely not the problem, life's too short to look crap.
    - bitwize 12y ago
      Most of Larry Ellison's charitable contributions have been to a foundation he set up with the goal of reversing aging in Larry Ellison.
    - bithush 12y ago
      Indeed I thought he was mid 50s, I was kind of shocked when I read 70. I am surprised I never knew this considering.
  - nmcfarl 12y ago
    Wow. Even after you said it I didn't really believe it, but googling confirms it - born in '44. And I thought he was younger than Gates - not 12 years older. https://www.google.com/search?q=larry+ellison+age https://www.google.com/search?q=larry+ellison+age
  - pavlov 12y ago
    A 70-year-old starts a new career as a CTO? If only other high tech companies were this open-minded about employing seniors.
    - scholia 12y ago
      He was already doing the CTO job, in effect. He's just retaining that post as well as becoming Executive Chairman, where he will still be in charge....
- mhurron 12y ago
  Busy producing an Iron Man suit? Running Oracle is getting in the way of being a Bond level supervillan? There could be lots of reasons.
  - jsmthrowaway 12y ago
    What is it about Ellison that makes people say Bond villain, beyond the yacht and such? You're not the first person I've heard say that. (I'm not critiquing, I think it's amusing.)
    - lclarkmichalek 12y ago
      He doesn't seem to like free software and Oracle charges a lot for their software. Literally Hitler
      - marcosdumay 12y ago
        The problem is not that it's expensive. What is wrong with Oracle's software is that people buy it mostly because migrating away is more expensive. And Oracle works hard to ensure that things will stay that way, even if that requires reducing the quality of their software.
      - rstupek 12y ago
        Wow doesn't like free software equates to killing millions in gas chambers?
    - parenthesis 12y ago
      He owns an island. The beard.
    - mhurron 12y ago
      Well he looks like one ... http://blogs.msdn.com/b/gwillis/archive/2009/10/14/separated-at-birth-larry-and-hank.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/gwillis/archive/2009/10/14/separated... Although Hank was supposed to be something of a nice guy.
    - 12y ago
- acornax 12y ago
  Pressure from the board maybe..?
turar 12y ago
Co-CEOs? I only know one company that had co-CEOs, and that didn't work out well for them.
- winslow 12y ago
  Which company was that?
  - jcagalawan 12y ago
    My guess is BlackBerry/Research in Motion.
  - dblohm7 12y ago
    RIM
  - noblethrasher 12y ago
    Probably RIM.
  - budu3 12y ago
    Probably RIM/Blackberry.
- jcagalawan 12y ago
  SAP did pretty well under co-CEOs.
- solomone 12y ago
  It worked pretty good for MySpace... oh wait
- MagicWishMonkey 12y ago
  Yep, it's like Hurding Catz. Ok I'll show myself out.
  - lotsofmangos 12y ago
    Ellison, Hurd and Catz. It does sound like Groucho Marx should be playing at least one of them.
chollida1 12y ago
Interesting that they name Co-CEO's in Catz and Hurd. I wonder how that will work, especially given Hurd's "tough to work with" reputation. Interestingly Ellison will be the CTO. This could be a shit show with 3 people trying to run the show! I mean does anyone really expect Larry Ellison to start taking marching orders. Will be interesting to watch the short interest on this company! I think the two headed CEO is what the street expected all along as Catz has been around for ever and alot of people thought that Hurd, the former HP CEO, was promised the CEO title when Ellison resigned. It looks like they, Catz and Hurd, will split the running of day to day operations as Hurd gets sales, marketing and strategy reporting to him, while Catz will continue to have finance, legal and manufacturing. Its down about a dollar after the close on about a third higher trading volume than normal. So it doesn't look like anyone is "spooked" by the news.
- keebEz 12y ago
  Oracle has been run by the three of them for awhile now. This is most likely a reduction in the responsibilities for Larry (ie. not getting flak for skipping out on earnings calls/keynotes when he wants to watch his boat race) and thus mostly a change in title without significant change to operations (other than messaging to the Street what the succession plan is).
  - j_baker 12y ago
    Yeah, I think Ellison is heading for a "phased" retirement. Eventually, he'll give up the CTO role and just be Chairman. Then he'll give up the Chairman role (perhaps when he dies).
    - shouldbeworking 12y ago
      I don't see becoming CTO as heading for retirement. If he wanted to semi-retire he could adopt some other title like Chief Software Architect. Also your mention of his eventual death sounds insulting. There are plenty of better things to pick apart Ellison for besides his age, and he isn't all that old. There isn't a single mention of his health in the wikipedia article about him: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Ellison http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Ellison
sebst 12y ago
Will Oracle then become better? Maybe as good as Sun used to be? just dreamin'...
- valarauca1 12y ago
  I doubt this'll happen. I wish this would happen. But I sincerely doubt this will happen. Sun really felt like a once in a life time company. I think the best thing we can hope for is board room infighting will just kill Oracle.
smacktoward 12y ago
I'm guessing he wants to spend more time wringing extortionate license fees out of his family?
mindcrime 12y ago
Not really sure what to say about this. I don't know Ellison, nor do I own Oracle stock, or have any particular interest in Oracle per-se. But nonetheless, I've always seen Ellison as an important character in our industry, and after reading a biography about him, I felt a sort of kinship with him based on some shared interests. At any rate, it definitely feels like the "end of an era" in a sense. I got my start in this industry in the mid to late 90's when Oracle, IBM, Novell, Microsoft, Borland, etc. were duking it out for supremacy, and - for better or worse - you've never really been able to escape Oracle's shadow to some extent. And Ellison was Oracle, in so many ways. Edit: It's been a while, but I think this[1] was the biography I read. I'll just say this: regardless of what you think of Ellison, he's an interesting character and reading about the history of Ellison / Oracle is quite fascinating. [1]: http://www.amazon.com/Softwar-Intimate-Portrait-Ellison-Oracle/dp/0743225058/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411072380&sr=1-1 http://www.amazon.com/Softwar-Intimate-Portrait-Ellison-Orac...
- lawnchair_larry 12y ago
  I'm not sure that you want to be finding kinship with sociopaths.
  - mindcrime 12y ago
    I don't really buy that line of thinking. Nobody is perfect, and I don't see denying "a certain sense of kinship" with a fellow human being, which is based on certain shared interests, just because I might dislike or disapprove of other aspects of that person's character. That said, I don't think I'd like Larry Ellison if I knew him (although I could be wrong). I'm just saying that there are things about him where I can see some overlap in thinking and interests. It doesn't mean I want him sainted or anything. :-)
dm8 12y ago
If you want to read about Larry Ellison's personality and his management style, you should read - "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: Inside Oracle Corporation; God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison". (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/181369.The_Difference_Between_God_and_Larry_Ellison_ http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/181369.The_Difference_Bet...) It's one of the best books written on him and the way he managed Oracle right from it's beginnings. He was damn good at selling things.
- mathattack 12y ago
  Very good book. He will be revered, but he was behind some scandals back in the day.
sebst 12y ago
Oracle's stock has already dropped 2.5%. http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/18/oracle-stock-drops-2-5-on-news-that-larry-ellison-has-relinquished-his-ceo-title/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/18/oracle-stock-drops-2-5-on-n...
justinph 12y ago
What is with the capitalization on the headline on Recode? I read it and thought, who is "Will Remain"? It should be: Larry Ellison will step down as CEO of Oracle, will remain as CTO Headline capitalization is pretty easy: Capitalize the first word, then any proper nouns. That's it.
- keebEz 12y ago
  It is correct according to most commonly used guidelines for headline capitalization. You were describing how to capitalize stuff in a paragraph, not a headline. http://www.grammarunderground.com/capitalization-of-headlines.html http://www.grammarunderground.com/capitalization-of-headline...
  - justinph 12y ago
    Well, I stand corrected. Dang.
- traek 12y ago
  >Headline capitalization is pretty easy: Capitalize the first word, then any proper nouns. That's it. Not really accurate. Some publications use sentence case for headlines, but most publications use (and most style guides suggest) title case.
- IvyMike 12y ago
  Still pretty popular in newspaper land. Despite your protestations, both the NYT and the WSJ websites still use title case. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_case#Headings_and_publication_titles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_case#Headings_and_publi... http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/19/technology/larry-ellison-steps-down-as-chief-of-oracle.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/19/technology/larry-ellison-s... http://online.wsj.com/articles/larry-ellison-to-step-aside-as-oracle-ceo-1411070636 http://online.wsj.com/articles/larry-ellison-to-step-aside-a... P.S. The other three sites I checked (LA Times, USA Today, and Washington Post) websites do not.
bsimpson 12y ago
Someone in The Verge's comment section noted that this Forbes list will now need to be updated: http://www.theonion.com/articles/forbes-releases-2014-list-of-most-punchable-ceos,35694/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/forbes-releases-2014-list-o...
spindritf 12y ago
The final Larry Ellison scorecard: Oracle stock is up 89,640% since he took the company public in March 1986. https://twitter.com/dkberman/status/512700128801464320 https://twitter.com/dkberman/status/512700128801464320
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
  - glurgh 12y ago
    You are mis-reading the comma.
ChuckMcM 12y ago
Demonstrating once again that tech companies really don't "get" succession planning :-) I'm kind of half joking, if you look at a bunch of 'old school' BigCorps, the progression is (CEO->Chairman, SVPx -> CEO, VPx -> SVPx) and then the Chairman of the board retires and the CEO takes on both roles Chairman and CEO, priming the pump for the next cycle. Co-CEOs have so far been an experiment in disaster, something about not having an ultimate authority seems to really crimp organizations. I wish Oracle well but they have a lot of challenges to overcome, if I were a share holder I wouldn't be all that pleased with this arrangement as it seems to basically leave all the same people in place with all the same problems (Amazon/Google EC2/GCE, MySQL vs NoSQL vs expensive Oracle, Cheap Clusters with High Reliablity vs Expensive Servers, Etc.)
- falsestprophet 12y ago
  Larry Ellison may "get" more about running a Fortune 100 tech company than you give him credit for.
  - ChuckMcM 12y ago
    You misinterpret my comment. He is masterful at running Oracle, the problem is he is mortal. Successions are all about building institutions that are immortal. Which is to say they continue to exist even as humans come and go. That is one of the key differences between a democracy and a dictatorship. In the latter when the dictator dies the country goes into civil war until another dictator arises, but in a democracy the 'people' in the system are constantly replaced by the country continues. Same is true for corporations. Technology companies tend to be driven more by one or two individuals who don't design an institution so much as they just run the business. I am fascinated that places like Ford and IBM have been as durable as they have been.
azifali 12y ago
The end of an era for Oracle that existed as a software (licensing) company. I think that Ellison stepping in as the CTO is probably more important than him stepping down as the CEO. This move will perhaps will lay the groundwork for the next tens of billions in revenue for Oracle, in cloud based software and infrastructure.

271 points by jhonovich 12y ago

joelrunyon 12y ago

Are there any more details into why he's doing this?

mrcharles 12y ago
Cause he's going to be CTO instead.
andyl 12y ago
Maybe it has something to do with him being 70?
- valevk 12y ago
  Wow, I never knew that he is 70. I thought 40-something. But he looks really young. In this picture he is 69! [1] [1] http://www.channelweb.co.uk/IMG/834/272834/big-ellison.jpg http://www.channelweb.co.uk/IMG/834/272834/big-ellison.jpg
  - mhurron 12y ago
    > I thought 40-something You know Oracle was founded in the late 70's. And Ellison was a co-founder.
  - mrcarlosrendon 12y ago
    His face looks great. I think you can see his age in his arm skin.
    - laichzeit0 12y ago
      Well he's obviously had some "work done". Which I think is great, why not? Money is surely not the problem, life's too short to look crap.
  - bitwize 12y ago
    Most of Larry Ellison's charitable contributions have been to a foundation he set up with the goal of reversing aging in Larry Ellison.
  - bithush 12y ago
    Indeed I thought he was mid 50s, I was kind of shocked when I read 70. I am surprised I never knew this considering.
- nmcfarl 12y ago
  Wow. Even after you said it I didn't really believe it, but googling confirms it - born in '44. And I thought he was younger than Gates - not 12 years older. https://www.google.com/search?q=larry+ellison+age https://www.google.com/search?q=larry+ellison+age
- pavlov 12y ago
  A 70-year-old starts a new career as a CTO? If only other high tech companies were this open-minded about employing seniors.
  - scholia 12y ago
    He was already doing the CTO job, in effect. He's just retaining that post as well as becoming Executive Chairman, where he will still be in charge....
mhurron 12y ago
Busy producing an Iron Man suit? Running Oracle is getting in the way of being a Bond level supervillan? There could be lots of reasons.
- jsmthrowaway 12y ago
  What is it about Ellison that makes people say Bond villain, beyond the yacht and such? You're not the first person I've heard say that. (I'm not critiquing, I think it's amusing.)
  - lclarkmichalek 12y ago
    He doesn't seem to like free software and Oracle charges a lot for their software. Literally Hitler
    - marcosdumay 12y ago
      The problem is not that it's expensive. What is wrong with Oracle's software is that people buy it mostly because migrating away is more expensive. And Oracle works hard to ensure that things will stay that way, even if that requires reducing the quality of their software.
    - rstupek 12y ago
      Wow doesn't like free software equates to killing millions in gas chambers?
  - parenthesis 12y ago
    He owns an island. The beard.
  - mhurron 12y ago
    Well he looks like one ... http://blogs.msdn.com/b/gwillis/archive/2009/10/14/separated-at-birth-larry-and-hank.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/gwillis/archive/2009/10/14/separated... Although Hank was supposed to be something of a nice guy.
  - 12y ago
acornax 12y ago
Pressure from the board maybe..?

turar 12y ago

Co-CEOs? I only know one company that had co-CEOs, and that didn't work out well for them.

winslow 12y ago
Which company was that?
- jcagalawan 12y ago
  My guess is BlackBerry/Research in Motion.
- dblohm7 12y ago
  RIM
- noblethrasher 12y ago
  Probably RIM.
- budu3 12y ago
  Probably RIM/Blackberry.
jcagalawan 12y ago
SAP did pretty well under co-CEOs.
solomone 12y ago
It worked pretty good for MySpace... oh wait
MagicWishMonkey 12y ago
Yep, it's like Hurding Catz. Ok I'll show myself out.
- lotsofmangos 12y ago
  Ellison, Hurd and Catz. It does sound like Groucho Marx should be playing at least one of them.

chollida1 12y ago

Interesting that they name Co-CEO's in Catz and Hurd. I wonder how that will work, especially given Hurd's "tough to work with" reputation. Interestingly Ellison will be the CTO. This could be a shit show with 3 people trying to run the show! I mean does anyone really expect Larry Ellison to start taking marching orders. Will be interesting to watch the short interest on this company! I think the two headed CEO is what the street expected all along as Catz has been around for ever and alot of people thought that Hurd, the former HP CEO, was promised the CEO title when Ellison resigned. It looks like they, Catz and Hurd, will split the running of day to day operations as Hurd gets sales, marketing and strategy reporting to him, while Catz will continue to have finance, legal and manufacturing. Its down about a dollar after the close on about a third higher trading volume than normal. So it doesn't look like anyone is "spooked" by the news.

keebEz 12y ago
Oracle has been run by the three of them for awhile now. This is most likely a reduction in the responsibilities for Larry (ie. not getting flak for skipping out on earnings calls/keynotes when he wants to watch his boat race) and thus mostly a change in title without significant change to operations (other than messaging to the Street what the succession plan is).
- j_baker 12y ago
  Yeah, I think Ellison is heading for a "phased" retirement. Eventually, he'll give up the CTO role and just be Chairman. Then he'll give up the Chairman role (perhaps when he dies).
  - shouldbeworking 12y ago
    I don't see becoming CTO as heading for retirement. If he wanted to semi-retire he could adopt some other title like Chief Software Architect. Also your mention of his eventual death sounds insulting. There are plenty of better things to pick apart Ellison for besides his age, and he isn't all that old. There isn't a single mention of his health in the wikipedia article about him: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Ellison http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Ellison

sebst 12y ago

Will Oracle then become better? Maybe as good as Sun used to be? just dreamin'...

valarauca1 12y ago
I doubt this'll happen. I wish this would happen. But I sincerely doubt this will happen. Sun really felt like a once in a life time company. I think the best thing we can hope for is board room infighting will just kill Oracle.

smacktoward 12y ago

I'm guessing he wants to spend more time wringing extortionate license fees out of his family?

mindcrime 12y ago

Not really sure what to say about this. I don't know Ellison, nor do I own Oracle stock, or have any particular interest in Oracle per-se. But nonetheless, I've always seen Ellison as an important character in our industry, and after reading a biography about him, I felt a sort of kinship with him based on some shared interests. At any rate, it definitely feels like the "end of an era" in a sense. I got my start in this industry in the mid to late 90's when Oracle, IBM, Novell, Microsoft, Borland, etc. were duking it out for supremacy, and - for better or worse - you've never really been able to escape Oracle's shadow to some extent. And Ellison was Oracle, in so many ways. Edit: It's been a while, but I think this[1] was the biography I read. I'll just say this: regardless of what you think of Ellison, he's an interesting character and reading about the history of Ellison / Oracle is quite fascinating. [1]: http://www.amazon.com/Softwar-Intimate-Portrait-Ellison-Oracle/dp/0743225058/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411072380&sr=1-1 http://www.amazon.com/Softwar-Intimate-Portrait-Ellison-Orac...

lawnchair_larry 12y ago
I'm not sure that you want to be finding kinship with sociopaths.
- mindcrime 12y ago
  I don't really buy that line of thinking. Nobody is perfect, and I don't see denying "a certain sense of kinship" with a fellow human being, which is based on certain shared interests, just because I might dislike or disapprove of other aspects of that person's character. That said, I don't think I'd like Larry Ellison if I knew him (although I could be wrong). I'm just saying that there are things about him where I can see some overlap in thinking and interests. It doesn't mean I want him sainted or anything. :-)

dm8 12y ago

If you want to read about Larry Ellison's personality and his management style, you should read - "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: Inside Oracle Corporation; God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison". (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/181369.The_Difference_Between_God_and_Larry_Ellison_ http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/181369.The_Difference_Bet...) It's one of the best books written on him and the way he managed Oracle right from it's beginnings. He was damn good at selling things.

mathattack 12y ago
Very good book. He will be revered, but he was behind some scandals back in the day.

sebst 12y ago

Oracle's stock has already dropped 2.5%. http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/18/oracle-stock-drops-2-5-on-news-that-larry-ellison-has-relinquished-his-ceo-title/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/18/oracle-stock-drops-2-5-on-n...

justinph 12y ago

What is with the capitalization on the headline on Recode? I read it and thought, who is "Will Remain"? It should be: Larry Ellison will step down as CEO of Oracle, will remain as CTO Headline capitalization is pretty easy: Capitalize the first word, then any proper nouns. That's it.

keebEz 12y ago
It is correct according to most commonly used guidelines for headline capitalization. You were describing how to capitalize stuff in a paragraph, not a headline. http://www.grammarunderground.com/capitalization-of-headlines.html http://www.grammarunderground.com/capitalization-of-headline...
- justinph 12y ago
  Well, I stand corrected. Dang.
traek 12y ago
>Headline capitalization is pretty easy: Capitalize the first word, then any proper nouns. That's it. Not really accurate. Some publications use sentence case for headlines, but most publications use (and most style guides suggest) title case.
IvyMike 12y ago
Still pretty popular in newspaper land. Despite your protestations, both the NYT and the WSJ websites still use title case. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_case#Headings_and_publication_titles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_case#Headings_and_publi... http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/19/technology/larry-ellison-steps-down-as-chief-of-oracle.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/19/technology/larry-ellison-s... http://online.wsj.com/articles/larry-ellison-to-step-aside-as-oracle-ceo-1411070636 http://online.wsj.com/articles/larry-ellison-to-step-aside-a... P.S. The other three sites I checked (LA Times, USA Today, and Washington Post) websites do not.

bsimpson 12y ago

Someone in The Verge's comment section noted that this Forbes list will now need to be updated: http://www.theonion.com/articles/forbes-releases-2014-list-of-most-punchable-ceos,35694/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/forbes-releases-2014-list-o...

spindritf 12y ago

The final Larry Ellison scorecard: Oracle stock is up 89,640% since he took the company public in March 1986. https://twitter.com/dkberman/status/512700128801464320 https://twitter.com/dkberman/status/512700128801464320

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
- glurgh 12y ago
  You are mis-reading the comma.

ChuckMcM 12y ago

Demonstrating once again that tech companies really don't "get" succession planning :-) I'm kind of half joking, if you look at a bunch of 'old school' BigCorps, the progression is (CEO->Chairman, SVPx -> CEO, VPx -> SVPx) and then the Chairman of the board retires and the CEO takes on both roles Chairman and CEO, priming the pump for the next cycle. Co-CEOs have so far been an experiment in disaster, something about not having an ultimate authority seems to really crimp organizations. I wish Oracle well but they have a lot of challenges to overcome, if I were a share holder I wouldn't be all that pleased with this arrangement as it seems to basically leave all the same people in place with all the same problems (Amazon/Google EC2/GCE, MySQL vs NoSQL vs expensive Oracle, Cheap Clusters with High Reliablity vs Expensive Servers, Etc.)

falsestprophet 12y ago
Larry Ellison may "get" more about running a Fortune 100 tech company than you give him credit for.
- ChuckMcM 12y ago
  You misinterpret my comment. He is masterful at running Oracle, the problem is he is mortal. Successions are all about building institutions that are immortal. Which is to say they continue to exist even as humans come and go. That is one of the key differences between a democracy and a dictatorship. In the latter when the dictator dies the country goes into civil war until another dictator arises, but in a democracy the 'people' in the system are constantly replaced by the country continues. Same is true for corporations. Technology companies tend to be driven more by one or two individuals who don't design an institution so much as they just run the business. I am fascinated that places like Ford and IBM have been as durable as they have been.

azifali 12y ago

The end of an era for Oracle that existed as a software (licensing) company. I think that Ellison stepping in as the CTO is probably more important than him stepping down as the CEO. This move will perhaps will lay the groundwork for the next tens of billions in revenue for Oracle, in cloud based software and infrastructure.