From Database Pioneer to World's Richest: How Larry Ellison's Life Turned into an AI Bet at 81

On September 10, 2025, something extraordinary happened in the wealth rankings. An 81-year-old tech mogul named Larry Ellison officially dethroned Elon Musk to become the world’s richest person. His net worth hit $393 billion that day—a staggering $100 billion jump in a single trading session. Oracle, the company he co-founded decades ago, had just announced a historic partnership: a $300 billion five-year deal with OpenAI. The market’s reaction was explosive—Oracle’s stock surged over 40% in one day, the biggest single-day gain since 1992.

But this moment isn’t just about numbers. It’s the culmination of a life defined by contradictions: an orphan who became a tech titan, a rebellious programmer who built a conservative empire, and a man who seems to get more adventurous—and more married—with age.

The Programmer Who Saw Gold in Data

Ellison’s journey started in 1944 in the Bronx, born to a teenage mother who couldn’t raise him. Adopted into a struggling middle-class family in Chicago, he bounced through universities before dropping out entirely. By the early 1970s, he was just another programmer at Ampex Corporation in California, working on storage systems and data processing projects.

What changed everything was a CIA contract. The government needed a system to manage and query massive amounts of data efficiently. The internal codename: “Oracle.” This project exposed Ellison to something his peers overlooked—the commercial potential of relational databases. While others saw a technical problem, he saw a trillion-dollar market waiting to be created.

In 1977, with $1,200 of his own money and two partners, Ellison launched Software Development Laboratories. They built a commercial database system inspired by their CIA work and called it Oracle. By 1986, it was public on NASDAQ. By the 1990s and 2000s, Oracle dominated the enterprise database world so completely that companies couldn’t imagine running their operations without it.

Ellison wasn’t an inventor in the pure sense—he was something arguably more valuable: a visionary who recognized commercial potential before anyone else and had the audacity to bet everything on it. For four decades, he remained Oracle’s driving force, holding nearly every executive role imaginable. Even after stepping down as CEO in 2014, he stayed as Executive Chairman and Chief Technology Officer.

The AI Gamble: A Late Move That Paid Off

Here’s where the September 2025 surge makes perfect sense. While Amazon and Microsoft dominated cloud computing in its early years, Oracle lagged behind. But Oracle had something they didn’t: relationships with every major enterprise on Earth and deep expertise in managing data at scale.

When generative AI exploded, suddenly every company needed massive data center infrastructure. OpenAI, training massive language models, needed computing power desperately. Microsoft had already claimed partnership rights early on. But there was room for another heavyweight supplier.

Oracle made its move. The company announced the strategic pivot: massive investments in AI data centers, partnerships with leading AI companies, and a complete organizational shift toward infrastructure that supports generative AI. In the summer of 2025, they laid off thousands from legacy hardware and traditional software divisions, redirecting resources toward AI infrastructure. The market recognized the gamble was working.

That $300 billion OpenAI partnership wasn’t just a commercial victory—it was Oracle’s vindication. A company that had seemed legacy was suddenly central to the infrastructure of the future. The 40% stock surge reflected this realization: Ellison’s late entry into AI infrastructure was perfectly timed.

A Life of Contradictions: Discipline Meets Indulgence

If Ellison’s professional life is about calculated risks, his personal life reads like a novel of contrasts. He owns nearly the entire Hawaiian island of Lanai, several California estates, and a yacht collection that reads like a floating museum. He’s married five times—his most recent marriage in 2024 to Jolin Zhu, a woman 47 years his junior, was revealed through a University of Michigan donation document listing “Larry Ellison and his wife.”

Yet at 81, he maintains the physique of someone decades younger. Former executives report that in his prime, Ellison spent several hours daily exercising, consuming only water and green tea, following a diet so disciplined it put professional athletes to shame. This obsession with physical performance extends to his passions: surfing (he nearly died in 1992 but never quit), professional sailing (he funded Oracle Team USA’s comeback America’s Cup victory in 2013), and tennis (he revived the Indian Wells tournament as the “fifth Grand Slam”).

He founded SailGP, a high-speed catamaran racing league that attracted heavyweight investors like Anne Hathaway and football superstar Mbappé. For Ellison, sports isn’t hobby—it’s his formula for staying young, hungry, and relevant. At an age when most billionaires sit on wealth, he’s out on the water, still chasing records.

Power, Philanthropy, and Personal Vision

Ellison’s influence extends beyond business. He’s long been a Republican Party supporter and significant political donor—$15 million to a senator’s Super PAC, funding presidential campaigns. In January 2025, he appeared at the White House alongside Masayoshi Son and Sam Altman to announce a $500 billion AI data center network. Oracle technology would be at the core.

His son, David Ellison, recently acquired Paramount Global for $8 billion (with $6 billion from family funds), expanding the Ellison empire into Hollywood. Two generations—tech and entertainment—building a cross-industry dynasty.

When it comes to charity, Ellison signed the Giving Pledge, committing to donate 95% of his wealth. But unlike Gates or Buffett, he operates independently. He donated $200 million to USC for cancer research and recently announced the Ellison Institute of Technology with Oxford University, focusing on healthcare innovation, affordable agriculture, and clean energy. He’s designing his own legacy rather than joining established philanthropic networks.

The Relentless Maverick

At 81, Larry Ellison is precisely what he’s always been: restless, competitive, and unwilling to fade into the background. He started with a CIA database contract, built an empire on relational data, and then—just when the world thought Oracle was yesterday’s news—he positioned himself at the center of AI infrastructure.

The world’s richest person title might change hands again (it always does), but what won’t change is Ellison’s refusal to become obsolete. In an era where AI is rewriting the rules of technology, the older generation of tech pioneers has proven they’re not finished yet. Ellison is still surfing, still married to new challenges, and still winning.