Larry Ellison Life is about 2 things with BIG subtitles

thank you for inviting me here today I’m

honored to be with you for your

graduation from the University of

Southern California this morning I’d

like to talk with you about how a few

experiences and a couple of ideas taught

me some important lessons and helped me

discover my dreams when I was your age

living and going to school in Chicago

back in the 1960s I used to dream about

this place the University of Southern

California back then this is all true

back then my dream was to go to the USC

Medical School get married raise a

family and practice medicine in Los

Angeles growing up in a lower

middle-class community on the south side

of Chicago medicine was considered the

pinnacle of professions noble and humane

virtually everyone important in my life

my family my teachers my girlfriend

wanted me to be a doctor over time their

dreams became my dreams they convinced

me I should be a doctor but as hard as I

tried I couldn’t do it after a few

difficult and unhappy years as a pre-med

student it became painfully clear to me

that I did not like the courses I was

taking I thought my comparative anatomy

class was a perversely pointless form of

psychological torture

especially the dissection labs and I

just could not make myself study

something that didn’t interest me at the

time I thought I lacked discipline and

that I was selfish maybe so but whatever

the underlying reasons I was unable to

make myself into the person that I

thought I should

so I decided to stop trying I was 21

years old when I dropped out of college

packed everything I owned jeans t-shirts

leather jacket guitar into my car and

drove from Chicago to Berkeley

California

I guess one small part of that

University of Southern California dream

was mine after all the California part

Berkeley in the 1960s was at the center

of everything the anti-war movement the

Free Speech Movement the human rights

movement it was the perfect place for an

undisciplined selfish 20-something to

begin his search for himself a righteous

cause and a job that he loved everyone

living in Berkeley in the 1960s opposed

the Vietnam War I was no different

it was the Age of Aquarius but I never

had long hair and I never wore love

beads I learned to play popular protest

songs on my guitar but I was never a

committed serious anti-war protester I

did find a cause however one I still

feel passionately about today a few

hours east of Berkeley are the Sierra

Nevada mountains I fell in love with

those mountains and the ineffable

natural beauty of Yosemite Valley I

cared about the wilderness and I wanted

to help preserve it I joined the Sierra

Club

I became an environmentalist

during my California Springs and summers

I spent most of my days in the High

Sierras in Yosemite Valley working as a

river guide and a rock climbing

instructor I loved at those jobs but

unfortunately they didn’t pay that well

so I also got a job working a couple of

days a week as a computer programmer

back in Berkeley I had learned a program

in college I didn’t love programming but

it was fun and I was good at it and

computer program programming gave me the

same kind of satisfaction as solving

math problems and playing chess both

things I enjoyed before before I became

a confused teenager at this point in my

life I thought I was making real

progress on my journey of self-discovery

I had found a cause I had a couple of

jobs that I loved and one that was fun

and paid the bills I was pretty happy

with my life my wife was not what she

saw was a college dropout who spent too

much time in the mountains doing foolish

things she wanted me to work full-time

as a computer programmer or go back to

college and finish my degree we

compromised sort of I started taking

classes at UC Berkeley I took several

classes but the only one I can remember

was a sailing class taught at Berkeley

marina

once again I fell in love and began a

lifelong affair with the limitless

omnipotent Pacific Ocean when my class

was over I wanted to buy a sailboat

my wife said this was the single

stupidest idea she had ever heard in her

entire life she accused me of being

irresponsible and she told me I lacked

ambition

she kicked me out and then she divorced

me this is a pivotal moment in my life

[Applause]

my family was still mad at me for not

going to medical school and now my wife

was divorcing me because I lacked

ambition it looked like a reoccurrence

of the same old problem once again I was

unable to live up to the expectations of

others but this time I was not

disappointed in myself for failing to be

the person they thought I should be

their dreams and my dreams were

different I would never confuse the two

of them again I had discovered things

that I loved the Sierras Yosemite the

Pacific Ocean these natural wonders

brought me great joy and happiness and

would for the rest of my life I had an

interesting job programming computers

and more money than I needed for the

first time I was certain that I was

going to survive in this world a huge

burden of fear had been lifted I’ll

never forget that moment it was a time

for rejoicing

I bought the sailboat and lived on board

just me and my cat in Berkeley marina in

the words of James Joyce I was alone and

young and willful and unheeded but I was

happy and near to the wild heart of life

throughout my 20s I continued

experimenting trying different things

racing bikes and boats and constantly

changing jobs it didn’t take me long to

discover that the most interesting and

rewarding programming jobs were found at

a cluster of companies located south of

Stanford University in north of San Jose

Silicon Valley was in its infancy I was

still in my 20s when I went to work for

my first Silicon Valley startup Amdahl

where we developed the world’s fastest

mainframe computer faster than anything

IBM had next stop was Ampex

where we built the world’s largest

digital data storage system then on to

precision instruments where we built an

even larger data storage system this

time using lasers I was the vice

president and charged with software

development it was all very cutting-edge

and challenging and cool I like my work

most of the time but I didn’t love it I

searched and I searched but I just could

not find a software engineering job that

I loved as much as I loved sailing so I

tried to create one I put together a

plan to start my own company that way I

could completely control my work

environment I would hire the most

talented programmers I knew and we would

all work together on the most

interesting and challenging software

projects my group my goal was to create

the perfect job for me a job I truly

loved I never expected the company to

grow beyond 50 people so maybe I really

did lack ambition or vision back then I

don’t know it was a long time ago and I

was very young anyway today Oracle

employs around 150,000 people but when I

started it was not my intention to build

a big company what happened well at

first we did exactly what we set out to

do hired the most talented software

engineers in Silicon Valley we assembled

an all-star team of gifted programmers

who were among the best in the world at

what they did that team plus one crazy

idea gave birth to a giant company I

call it a crazy idea because at the time

everyone told me

it was a crazy idea the idea was to

build the world’s first relational

database several theoretical papers

about relational databases had already

been published and IBM was building a

prototype in their research labs but

back then the collective wisdom of

computer experts was that while

relational databases could be built they

would never be fast enough to be useful

I thought all those so-called

computer experts were wrong and when you

start telling people that all the

experts are wrong at first

they call you arrogant and then they say

you’re crazy so remember this graduates

when people start telling you that

you’re crazy you just might be on to the

most important innovation in your life

of course the other possibility is

you’re crazy

this is one of those times when the

experts were wrong arrogance and

insanity turned out to be innovation in

disguise the Oracle database proved to

be a defining technology at the dawn of

the Information Age the Oracle database

also totally upended my plans to build a

small comfortable company a perfect

place for me and a few of my friends to

work as the Information Age moved from

dawn to the full light of day technology

horizons were constantly shifting

revealing a brave and exciting world of

new possibilities and new opportunities

Oracle doubled in size year after year

after year for 10 years I had set out to

create the perfect programming job from

me instead I created a job where I had

to stop programming altogether I I

attempted to create an environment that

I could completely control instead I was

running a company with thousands and

thousands of people that was growing so

fast that it was impossible for anyone

to control it was like sailing in a

hurricane and then we went public oh my

god maybe I should have been a doctor

I was constantly learning on on-the-job

training I think they call it everyday

learned something new and interesting

something that I did not know the day

before unlike that my new job was

challenging captivating consuming I

worked all the time but thinking back

I’m pretty sure I didn’t love it

or maybe I was just too tired to even

know how I felt but I had found a place

in the world my family finally forgave

me for not going to medical school and

nobody ever accused me of lacking

ambition again now I’d like to tell you

one last story about my best friend a

guy who had lots of crazy ideas and

taught me an important lesson my 30-year

friendship with Steve Jobs was made up

of a thousand walks if there was

something he wanted to talk about and

there always was we’d go for a walk we

climbed to the top of Windy Hill hiked

around Castle Rock or through the sands

on on the beach at Kona Village over the

years one particular walk stands out we

had a lot to talk about that day so we

jumped in the car put the top down and

headed out to Castle Rock Rock State

Park

in the Santa Cruz Mountains it was over

20 years ago back in mid-1995 Steve was

finishing up Toy Story at Pixar and

running next the computer company he

founded after he left Apple Apple was in

severe distress it had gone steadily

downhill during the ten years of Steve’s

absence the problems were now so serious

people were wondering if Apple would

survive it was all too painful to watch

and stand by and do nothing so the

purpose of that particular hike through

the Santa Cruz Mountains on that

particular day was to discuss taking

over Apple Computer my idea was simple

by Apple and immediately makes Steve CEO

Apple wasn’t worth much back then about

five billion dollars we both had really

good credit and I had already arranged

to borrow all the money all Steve had to

do was say yes Steve proposed a somewhat

more circuitous approach first persuade

Apple to buy next computer then Steve

would join the Apple board and over time

the board would recognize that Steve was

the right guy to lead the company I said

okay that might work but Steve if we

don’t buy Apple how are we gonna make

any money suddenly Steve stopped walking

and turned toward me we were facing each

other when he put his left hand on my

right shoulder and his right hand on my

left shoulder staring unblinkingly into

my eyes Steve said Larry this is why

it’s so important that I’m your friend

you don’t need any more money I said

yeah I know I know then I came and I

said but we don’t have to keep it we

could give it all away I was whining

Steve just shook his head and said I’m

not doing this for the money

I don’t want to get paid if I do this I

need to do this standing on the moral

high ground the moral high ground I said

well that just might be the most

expensive real estate on earth but I

knew I had lost the argument

Steve had made up his mind right there

and then at Castle Rock in the summer of

1995 to save Apple his way at the end of

the hike right before we got back into

the car

I said Steve you created Apple it’s your

company and it’s your call I’ll do

whatever you want me to do I went on the

Apple board and then I watched Steve

build the most valuable company on earth

[Applause]

the lesson here is very clear to me

Steve was right after a certain point it

can’t be about the money after a certain

point you can’t spend it no matter how

hard you try I know I’ve tried hard but

it’s impossible in the end the only

practical option is to give nearly all

of it away so why did Steve go back to

Apple why did he devote so much of what

remained of his life to his job why do I

I believe the answer is that deep inside

of all of us all of us there’s a primal

desire to do something important with

our lives and Freud said there are only

two things important in life love and

work he did not say love and work were

the same thing I’m passionate about my

work it continues to give me great

satisfaction in a sense of who I am but

passion and love are different at least

for me they are I love my family a few

precious friends four cats two dogs

cherry blossoms in Japan Pacific island

beaches and bays and the majestic Sierra

Nevada mountains where it all began for

me my feelings about work are very

intense but quite different

there’s a TV advertisement for the

United States Navy that says it’s not

just a job it’s an adventure that’s

exactly how I feel about my years in

Silicon Valley in interesting

challenging all-consuming adventure like

any ongoing adventure I have no idea how

it ends but I know it will for me and a

long long time for now from now for all

of you but today graduates you are

beginning your great adventure your

generation will change the world as

every generation does you will invent

new technologies and create new types of

art impossibilities will be transformed

into possibilities and unexpected

opportunities will present themselves

you will change the world and the world

will change you as you learn and grow

and discover more about yourself

remember this graduates in a constantly

changing world what is possible is a

moving target don’t be afraid to

experiment and try lots of different

things and don’t let the experts us

courage you when you when you challenge

the status quo like Mark Twain says

what’s an expert anyway just some guy

from out of town each of you has a

chance to discover who you are rather

than who you should be a chance to live

your dreams not the dreams of others

each of you has an obligation to commit

to a righteous cause one that elevates

you and improves the conditions of

humanity and the planet soon many of you

will begin a new job I hope it interest

you and challenges you and rewards you

with a sense of purpose and satisfaction

but if it doesn’t keep searching it’s

out there it might take a while but keep

searching until you find a job that

ignites your passions like I did even

better you just might find one that you

love thank you and congratulations

[Applause]