This 80-Year-Old Tech Billionaire Just Overtook Mark Zuckerberg as the Second-Richest Person in the World Larry Ellison founded the cloud computing company, Oracle, in 1977, where he still serves as the chief technology officer.
By Sherin Shibu Edited by Melissa Malamut
Key Takeaways
- Larry Ellison, 80, is the founder and chief technology officer of Oracle.
- As of late Tuesday, Ellison is the second-richest person in the world, overtaking Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
- Ellison’s net worth has grown as Oracle’s stock price has doubled over the past two years due to the AI boom.
Larry Ellison, the 80-year-old founder and chief technology officer of software giant Oracle, is now the world's second-wealthiest person.
For the first time, Ellison has overtaken Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, 41, on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index to claim the No. 2 spot. According to a Bloomberg report from late Tuesday, Ellison's net worth is now $251.2 billion, higher than Zuckerberg's $251 billion but less than Elon Musk's $358 billion.
Since ChatGPT's release in late 2022, Oracle has experienced significant growth among enterprise customers, who are eager to tap into the company's cloud services for AI computing.
As Oracle's largest shareholder, with a stake of about 40% in the software company that comprises more than 80% of his wealth, Ellison has seen his fortune grow as Oracle's stock has skyrocketed due to the AI boom. According to The Wall Street Journal, Oracle's stock price has doubled over the past two years, pushing the company's market value to around $650 billion.
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A lot of that growth has been concentrated in recent gains. Oracle's shares have gained more than 90% since late April alone, per Bloomberg. Ellison, who founded Oracle in 1977 and served as CEO until 2014, has seen that growth reflected in his net worth.
Oracle founder Larry Ellison. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
Oracle's most recent earnings report, released last month, tells the story of a growing giant. The company's quarterly revenues were up 11% year-over-year to reach $15.9 billion, driven by a 14% increase in cloud services revenue.
Oracle CEO Safra Catz predicted in the report that revenue growth rates would be "dramatically higher" in the year ahead as the company experiences growth in its cloud business.
Oracle is competing against other cloud providers like Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, and Google Cloud, which also offer cloud storage and computing services for businesses.
According to Synergy Research Group, Oracle captured 3% of the global cloud infrastructure market in the first quarter of the year, compared to the 63% captured collectively by Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure. It was the fifth-largest cloud provider by market share.
Oracle has recently announced a number of AI deals. Earlier this week, the company said it would invest $3 billion to expand its AI and cloud infrastructure in Germany and the Netherlands. Last month, Oracle inked a $30 billion annual cloud deal with OpenAI to provide the ChatGPT-maker with cloud computing power to support a growing number of AI users.
Oracle is now the 16th most valuable company in the world by market capitalization.
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