Oracle's Larry Ellison quits as CEO – new bosses are Hurd'n'Catz Oracle has, in the past few minutes, announced that company founder Larry Ellison has stepped down as chief executive, effective immediately. Outspoken Ellison will remain with the company in the capacity of chief technology officer, and he will continue to oversee all software and hardware engineering functions, Oracle said …
To be honest, I didn't know he was 70. I don't know why but I expected him to be maybe in his late 50's. He's run the company for much longer than I would have. I just feel sorry for the Oracle sailing team, now he's free to go micromanage them if he so chooses.
After working that hard for so long I'm sure he could use a break. He's about the only human being that could conceivably build a Ducktales-esq money bin to swim around in on his Hawaiian island. He could tweet what Biggie Smalls said: something like "@LarryMegabucks "Cash rules everything around me" #biggiesmalls #notoriousthugz #oracle #capitalism #IownanIsland #ducktales" and actually be able to follow it by posting a picture of himself and stacks of cash, stock certificates, bonds and other items of value that are all actually his own money to go along with it. Instead of how rappers do it with a bunch of prop money and maybe one stack of their own.
I hope El Reg doesn't retire the article graphic of Larry in his sea of money here though. I always quite liked that one, especially on stories about Oracle's losses, just to keep things in perspective that the man alone is worth more than a number of sovereign states GDP and GNP.
"follow it by posting a picture of himself and stacks of cash, stock certificates, bonds and other items of value that are all actually his own money "
Let's see Larry do a KLF (OK, K Foundation) and burn a serious chunk. For art's sake.
Or donate it to charity. Maybe the Gates Foundation?
or "Islands in the sun for those that dont have one"
That might massage his ego as he leaves the top spot at Oracle.....
But wait a moment he is not leaving the top slot...............
As CTO reporting to the new CEO's that are held accountable by the Exec Chair which is ehhhhh Larry he still has a stranglehold on the business.
Very strange
And Oracle isn't an odd company, how exactly? I'd figure people used to watching them would expect them to do counterintuitive and downright strange things. I mean who else would have hired Mark Hurd after being CEO of HP? I wouldn't want that on my resume.
Not to mention the sexual harassment issue.
But really, what other Database company do you know of that would still design its own non-ARM processor architecture while making no profits from it, coming up on five years after purchasing its originator?
See the thing with you database types, as distinct from the software engineer types, is that the database types often don't understand recursion. Ellison reporting to himself (even via an intermediary) is recursion. Like any other recursion, it'll have to stop sooner or later, one way or another. If not planned for up front, the results may be unexpected and quite possibly unpleasant. Recursion used inappropriately may consume more resources than other more appropriate tactics. Etc.
I echo AC's comments about working under Hurd. The sleaze-bag rises to the surface again and I've no doubt he will start sharpening his axe again for the short-term stock price hike and another obscene bonus.Look out especially if you are female and 10 years or more younger than him!
Larry is not an engineer
While not an Engineer, he is not a Hurd (you can replace a letter in that for an exact definition). He has done quite a few acquisitons which were looking forward by way more than a year and has kept them going. Not something I can say about the *urd.
"Engineering will still report to Larry.
So, the death by a thousand Hurds of any R&D in Oracle is postponed for the duration."
I don't think that would make any material difference to the customer, Oracle's R&D strategy over the past decade appears to consist of two plays "buy next big thing" and "gouge the customers".
While I worked for EDS I loved those ads, especially the airplanes in the sky one - taking off with no idea of a destination, frantically putting things together at the last minute, and expecting the tech staff to wing it to a plan ... yep, that was EDS.
* IBM... Long slow decline
* Sun... Long slow decline
* Microsoft... Beginning a long slow decline (IMO) - fighting hard to stave it off (to their credit) but a long slow decline nevertheless
* EDS... Long slow decline
Now, I think, we're beginning to see the same happen to Oracle. It'll take a long time I think, I mean, they're bringing in 8 BILLION a quarter. That's seriously impressive. However, ultimately, I think Open Source databases that are "good enough" are going to win out. Companies are beginning to seriously evaluate alternatives, being offended by lock-in style selling practices and punishingly expensive rates. I think they've had enough. There's a whiff of software revolution in the air.
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