Larry Ellison Spends $500 million On Island
Oracle guru Larry Ellison has always been famous for buying large, expensive toys, but you don’t get a much bigger or more expensive toy than his latest acquisition. A Hawaiian island.
According to news reports, Ellison spent several days in financial negotiations and in direct competition with Bill Gates but finally came out the winner. He is now the proud owner of Lanai, the sixth biggest island in Hawaii.
The reported price? A Hawaiian newspaper estimated that at between $500 million and $600 million, although the actual price tag has not been made public.
As for what Larry Ellison plans to do with the island, he hasn’t spoken about the Lanai purchase in public much, but speculation was that he may spend some of his billions on promoting tourism on the island.
But Ellison said: “I love Hawaii, and Lanai is a very interesting project. There, what we’re going to do is turn Lanai into a model for sustainable enterprise.”
“The electric utility is all going to be solar, photovoltaic and solar-thermal.
“We’re going to convert sea water into fresh water. And then, have drip irrigation where we’re going to have organic farms all over the island.
“We’re going to support the local people and help them start these businesses.”
Ellison, however, is a nature fanatic and has said he will be using Lanai as an ‘environmental laboratory’ to work on various new environmentally-friendly technologies. He also plans to help some of the locals open or expand their own independent businesses.