Larry Ellison Rejuvenating Hawaii's Sixth-Largest Island (Which He Owns)

McGruber writes "In June of 2012, we discussed news that Larry Ellison, co-founder and chief executive of Oracle, purchased the Hawaiian island Lanai for $300 million. Ellison now owns nearly everything on the island, including many of the candy-colored plantation-style homes and apartments, one of the two grocery stores, the two Four Seasons hotels and golf courses, the community center and pool, water company, movie theater, half the roads and some 88,000 acres of land. (2% of the island is owned by the government or by longtime Lanai families.) Now Ellison is attempting to win over the island's small, but wary, local population, one whose economic future is heavily dependent on his decisions. He and his team have met with experts in desalination and solar energy to change the way water and electricity are generated, collected, stored and delivered on the island. They are refurbishing residential housing intended for workers (Mr. Ellison's Lanai Resorts owns and manages 400 of the more than 1,500 housing units on the island). They've tackled infrastructure, such as lengthening airport runways and paving county roads. And to improve access to Lanai, Mr. Ellison bought Island Air earlier this year and is closing a deal to buy another airline."

Comments

impossible

[roman_mir]

This is impossible, no private enterprise builds infrastructure, works on long term projects, etc. Only governments do that.

--

For the sarcastically challenged: Ellison is expecting some form of a return from this purchase, all purchases that are not for consumption are investments and he is not going to 'consume' his properties, so whatever it is he does with infrastructure, etc., it's all designed to try and create revenue streams, which is what private enterprise does and which is why infrastructure projects should all be privately funded, then their economic viability, success or failure are on the backs of the owners and not tax payers.

Re:impossible

[flyneye]

With enough money, you are the government. Haven't you been paying attention to U.S. history at all?

Re:impossible

[PopeRatzo]

This is impossible, no private enterprise builds infrastructure, works on long term projects, etc. Only governments do that.

Ellison hasn't done anything but buy a bunch of stuff yet. And by the way, he bought most of the island of Lanai from another private enterprise.

Further, if the people don't like what Ellison is does with the place, what can they do, vote him off the island?

Anyway, might be worth keeping an eye on this project a little longer before you start your Galtian touchdown dance, roman_mir, the history of private enterprise owning islands really isn't all that pleasant, at least for the people who live in those places.

Re:impossible

[__aaltlg1547]

Ellison is one of the more productive people in the world, he was able to devise a machine that is his company, that makes him one of the most productive people out there. All of his employees, all of his properties, they are all extensions of this machine.

I'd put it a little differently. Ellison is a very clever man who has devised a way of diverting a fraction of the productivity of over 100,000 people into his pocket. That way is the Oracle Corporation. Indirectly, his company diverts a fraction of the productivity of about 390,000 corporate customers comprising the efforts of millions of people into his pocket.

Nobody ever accumulated great wealth any other way. The most you can ever achieve from your own productivity is to be moderately comfortable.

Re:impossible

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand, with private enterprise, boycotting them is about all you can do, which sucks if your whole life is there. If someone bought your county and made your life unbearable, would you consider moving away an acceptable remedy? What if that meant leaving your friends and family and maybe the business that you worked your whole life to build.

Re:impossible

[sanman2]

Ellison is a clever man who helped invent the modern RDBMS, which is the basis for much of today's information technology.

What have you invented lately?

"Henry Ford was a clever man who invented the otherwise useless automobile, which helped him to divert the productivity of his newly created workforce into filling his personal pocketbook"

"Edison was a crafty fellow who invented this light bulb thing which wasn't very useful, except to divert the productivity of many workers into fattening his own wallet"

"Einstein was a cunning patent clerk who came up with this stupid Relativity thing, which wasn't very useful to anyone except Einstein, because it allowed him to cleverly gain the confidence of the so-called scientific community, while also turning him into a household name."

"Slashdot was invented just to provide an outlet for too-clever-by-half Tinfoil Hatters (Haters?)..."

Re:impossible

[lxs]

if I don't like a company I can boycott them and take my money elsewhere. Government, not so much.

What's stopping you from moving to a country that has a government more to your liking?

Re:impossible

[Anonymous Coward]

Ellison is a clever man who helped invent the modern RDBMS, which is the basis for much of today's information technology.

Oh please.
Ellison is a clever man who implemented parts of a modern RDBMS. The invention happened elsewhere, and without Ellison the field would have been advanced at pretty much the same pace. He is noted mainly for his business acumen and inhuman practices to achieve his goals.

That's as stupid as saying Steve Jobs invented the iPod, the Mouse, the Desktop, or Multitasking. He didn't.

Re: impossible

[Anonymous Coward]

They won't grant me citizenship.

Re: impossible

[Shark]

The way to solve that was to have 50 states and very little federal law thus creating competition among the states for population, which directly correlates with their tax revenues. Now that the federal government took over everything and made most of the states indentured servants, finding another country is the only real option left if you don't like your government's way of managing things.

Re:impossible

[abirdman]

Ellison didn't invent the Oracle database, he bought the efforts of those who did. Larry Ellison is the same as every Afghan warlord, Saudi princeling, or Russian oligarch-- a twisted parasite on the planet. His efforts did not create productivity, they stole productivity.

Re:impossible

[saleenS281]

That depends entirely on what the private company is offering. If the private company owns the only road between your house and your job, how are you planning on boycotting?

At least with government I know their motivation for building and maintaining that road isn't a 60% gross profit margin every quarter. You can argue about inefficiencies but I can tell you first hand there isn't a fortune 100 company in this country that is anymore efficient than our federal government. Size breeds inefficiency, it's just a fact of life.

Re:impossible

[Immerman]

Not to mention water, power, communication (less so nowadays), etc.etc.etc. There are a *lot* of regional natural monopolies in the world, and where those are involved the free market pretty much guarantees that everyone gets shafted.

Re: impossible

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that the federal government took over everything and made most of the states indentured servants

Still upset about that civil war are we?

Re:impossible

[poity]

Well, the Mr. House ending was the most favorable outcome New Vegas could have had. So there's that.

Re:impossible

[Skreems]

which is why infrastructure projects should all be privately funded, then their economic viability, success or failure are on the backs of the owners and not tax payers.

Let's explore that thought a bit.

Say the local islanders dislike Mr. Ellison's policies. Say, for example, that someone wants to start a local airline which competes with the ones that already serve the island. Well, the ones that serve the island are owned by Ellison, and any competition is going to eat into profits. Fortunately (for him) he also owns the airport, so he can just refuse to allow the 3rd party airline to fly there.

Of course this competing airline could start their own airport, but that's likely prohibitively expensive. And even if they had they money, Larry owns all the land on the island, so he can just refuse to lease them land on which to run an airport.

The inhabitants of this island are, for all intents and purposes, indentured peasants to Larry Ellison. He has an effective monopoly on their food, housing, and transport off the island, and they have only as much say in how he runs things as he feels like letting them have. If you honestly think that's a good way to live, then I'll be happy to purchase your house and vehicle from you and let you pay me rent (at a rate that I choose, of course).

Of course Lanai is an extreme example, but similar problems occur when you try to run certain types of infrastructure projects with private companies on the mainland. For certain classes of things like roads, water/sewer lines, and probably electric, the amount of space and planning required makes it prohibitive to build multiple competing services. You can't have a city based on TWO separate street grids. And trying to run more than one water system or electric grid through the same town would get intrusive and immensely confusing in all but the most sparsely populated areas.

So what you end up with out of necessity is either a government monopoly or a private one. You no longer have the ability to "take your money elsewhere" so the private company has zero incentive to listen to you. With the government monopoly, though, you get two major benefits: one, you're guaranteed a vote, and in a local government that means a lot more than at the federal level; and two, the government's goal is to serve the needs of the citizens, NOT to make a profit off them.

In short, you've grossly oversimplified the problem. Of course private corporations COULD own and run infrastructure projects. Nobody's disputing that. But it's highly unlikely that they would run it WELL in cases where competition isn't feasible.

Re:impossible

[__aaltlg1547]

Yeah, those hundred thousand employees would have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO if they didn't work for Oracle, because apparently according to you software designers and programmers and salespeople basically have no value until some industrialist tells them what to do.

Reaganomics!

[kurt555gs]

This is the end result. Oligarchs. Trickle Down Economics was a scam.

Modus Operandi

[Aaron B Lingwood]

1. Buy property / imaginary property
2. Close it up
3. Anger the community
4. Wait for staff to quit
5. Replace existing features with unwanted bling
6. Force users of Island #5 to use the new facilities offered on Island #6
7. ?
8. Profit

the biggest socialist bailout in history

[decora]

happened under a republican president, the son of Reagan's vice president, whil the treasury secretary was a former Goldman Sachs CEO.

you are hereby banned from ever complaining about 'socialist democrats' ever again. ever.

Great until you fall out with the king

[fantomas]

Benevolent dictatorships are fine as long as you agree with the king/laird/CEO/ whatever.

Fall out with him and you'll lose your house, your job, and all those related to you might suffer. Rich people running islands is not a great long term plan. Ask the population of Eigg in Scotland, for example. All good until your nice rich person gets bored with his toy and neglects local services that people need, or sells it to a Bad Rich Person, etc.

I would have though US citizens, of all the places in the world, would have a historical perspective on what happens when uncaring kings run your country, and what the poor but honest citizens should do to resolve the lack of decision making power.

Very curious. Of course Ellison might be a lovely chap and improve the situation - it sounds like people do need improved services... but one man owning an island and having no accountability on his decision making power over people's homes and jobs, this makes me nervous... it's not like the people living here can change employers or move down the road if they are unhappy, it's an island. I'd be interested to hear his thoughts about the democratic processes, how the local people have the option to veto his decisions if they disagree, and so forth.

If he's really in it for the long term, wouldn't it make more sense to go for independence from the USA and ask the people to elect him as their President?

Re:competition

[txoutback]

but the fact is that competition forces them to become efficient and sacrifice profit.

Sadly, this is too often accomplished by externalizing costs to the environment and to the general long-term physical health of the population... ultimately putting whatever expenses can be externalized onto the government and tax payers.

Re:Incredible

[Nerdfest]

The problem with Oracle is two-fold. Large organizations have products chosen by buyers, not developers, and PostgresSQL et al do not buy lunches, golf outings, or vacations. In addition, many people after having Oracle around for a bit make the mistake of using it as more than just a database, putting business logic, etc, in their database layer using Oracle's proprietary extensions. This makes it extremely difficult to switch products. Oracle can raise prices quite a lot and people pretty much have to keep paying. This is why typing your business to a proprietary product or format with a single provider is generally a very bad idea.

Ellison's an awful person

[tgeller]

Ellison has a history of being just terrible. When the San Carlos airport cite him for breaking noise ordinances when he flies in during "quiet" hours -- you know, waking up uncounted residents in the area -- he just laugh and pays the fine, over and over again. Now he's suing the airport in San Jose airport so he can do the same thing to that city's 800,000 residents.

Hawaiians can expct zero consideration from this proven douchebag.

Re:One Rich A** Called Larry Ellison

[PRMan]

And yet you keep giving him money... Strange.

Hyperbole in a headline?

[Rob_Bryerton]

Hyperbole in a headline? No, I just can't beleive it.

Ellison does not own this Hawaiian island. It is a portion of a state, as in one of the states that comprise the United States. He holds title (or more likely, a bank does) for a significant portion of the lots on this island. He does not "own the island".

Even if he aquired the title to every square mm of land on that island, he still would not own it. That just allows you to build on and occupy the land at the governments pleasure. And remember, even if you have a title to a plot of land, whatever is below the surface certainly does not belong to you. And because of the construct of Eminent Domain, you only have the right to occupy/use a portion of real estate as long as the government has no use for it.

Unless you are the federal government, you cannot truly own a shred of real estate in the real sense of the word "own". It's never fully yours to do with as you see fit.

Yep

[rsilvergun]

and If I don't like Larry and I live on that island I can boycott him. Wait, no. I can't. He _owns_ the entire island. Seriously, can we all just just read the wikipedia article on the railroad trusts and call it a day? Oh, and vote. We can vote. Heck, I'll bet the number of successful changes due to election dwarfs the number of successes from a boycott. Can anyone name me the last successful large scale boycott?

yeah uhm

[decora]

1. so there was no dotcom burst?

2. when was the first CDO created?

3. when the GOP controlled both houses of congress and the presidency in the early 2000s, why didnt they repeal it then?

4. im not saying clinton wasnt involved, but the guy tried to blame the whole thing on 'communist democrats' which is what they call, "a fucking lie written by a stupid asshole" in the business.