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If you are looking for an entrepreneur to aspire to be like or an individual with a lifestyle that you would absolutely love to lead then you now need to look no further. Larry Ellison fills all the criteria as laid out above. Not only is he one of the most powerful and richest men in the world but he has also got to where he wanted to go the hard way. In fact, sheer hard work enabled him to overcome his poor early start in life.

Larry Ellison’s Early Life

Lawrence Joseph Ellison was born in New York on August 17, 1944. At the time, his father had abandoned his mother, who was herself an unmarried Jew. Larry Ellison did not actually meet her until the age of 48 though because an aunt and uncle adopted him at birth. They lived in Chicago, which is where the entrepreneur grew up. His adoptive parents were not poor but they lost their fortune in the Depression. As he grew up, this made sure that Ellison was determined not to follow in their footsteps.

Larry Ellison was always a gifted student when he put his mind to it but, unless a subject interested him, he paid little attention. As such, he managed to get to the University of Illinois but left after just two years. A year later, he enrolled in the University of Chicago but quit after having his first taste of computer programming. He was hooked and knew exactly what he wanted to do for a living.

The Entrepreneurial Path

Larry Ellison moved to California shortly after dropping out of university and worked hard at several companies in order to eventually get a job at the Ampex Corporation in the early 1970s. It was there that he first designed the program that would ultimately make him a billionaire. He worked on a project that aimed to complete a comprehensive database for the CIA and during the process, the entrepreneur invented Oracle.

In 1977, Ellison created the company that was to eventually be named after his invention but it was called Software Development Laboratories (SDL) originally and then renamed Relational Software Inc. Only then was it renamed Oracle. The company did face a lot of challenges in its early years, as well as financial ruin. At one stage, the entrepreneur was a whisker away from declaring bankruptcy. However, it just about made it through. The most serious competition between Oracle and a rival come in 1994 in the shape of Informix. It took until 1997 to blow the competition out of the water, but Oracle has gone from strength to strength ever since. It has of course faced other challenges but none as threatening.

Not only did Ellison own Oracle but he was also on the Board of Directors of Apple between 1997 and 2002 beside best friend and fellow entrepreneur Steve Jobs. This may be why his net personal wealth currently stands at $25 billion. He was the richest man in the world in 2000 but today has to be content being the richest Californian and sitting at 14th overall.

Larry Ellison the entrepreneur has indeed worked hard to get where he is now and reaps the available rewards by living a rather lavish lifestyle. For example, he owns the fifth largest yacht in the world, has a private jet, several lavish and rare cars, and owns an estate in Woodside, California that is worth $200 million. Ellison enjoys his hobbies but still works hard, which is why his fortune keeps on growing. This is why he is living proof that it is possible to work your way to the top, as well as how to make mistakes and survive.