In the early 2000s, Larry Ellison found himself caught in a very specific and very billionaire problem. He had built a yacht so large that it became a liability. The 138-meter (450 feet) Rising Sun, built by Lürssen in Germany and designed by the legendary Jon Bannenberg, was originally intended to be 120 meters long.
But partway through construction, Ellison decided to extend it by another 18 meters. The reason was petty, pointed, and perfectly in character: to ensure that his yacht would be longer than Paul Allen’s 126-meter (414 feet) Octopus, as reported by Yachting Magazine. In the unofficial but very real yacht wars of Silicon Valley, size was everything.
Rising Sun was not simply a large boat. It was a floating palace with 82 rooms spread over five decks and over 8,000 square meters of interior space. The vessel featured floor-to-ceiling windows in each stateroom, a basketball court on the main deck that doubled as a helipad, a private cinema, multiple tenders, a 4×4 Jeep, and a landing craft to bring guests and toys ashore. The power plant generated 36,000 kilowatts, allowing the yacht to cruise at 28 knots, which is an impressive feat for a ship of its mass and scale.
Despite all this, the project soon revealed itself as a classic case of form over function. While Rising Sun had presence and power, it was simply too large to dock in many of the glamorous harbors favored by the global elite. Places like Monaco, Antibes, and Cannes could not accommodate a vessel of that length, leaving Ellison anchored offshore next to oil tankers while his guests commuted by tender. During high-profile events, this proved to be a serious drawback. Visibility in these social settings mattered. Being anchored a mile out at sea while others paraded their smaller, flashier yachts closer to shore defeated the whole purpose.
Over time, Ellison realized that he had built a yacht more suited for a billionaire’s ego than a billionaire’s lifestyle. In what could be seen as an admission of regret, he began stepping away from Rising Sun. First, he sold a 50 percent stake to music mogul David Geffen. Later, he sold the remaining ownership, leaving Geffen as the sole owner. Unlike Ellison, Geffen embraced the yacht’s massive scale and continues to use it, albeit with more discretion.
Yacht envy among the ultra-rich is not new. These floating fortresses have become status symbols, a way to measure influence in meters. Paul Allen’s Octopus, complete with a submarine, helipad, and Arctic-class hull, was once the pinnacle. Ellison’s Rising Sun overtook it in size but struggled in utility.
Roman Abramovich raised the stakes further with Eclipse, a yacht equipped with a missile defense system and a mini-submarine. Today, Gulf royals and tech billionaires continue to commission even larger vessels, each one trying to eclipse the last in a race that never seems to end.
Ellison’s decision to build such a behemoth speaks to a broader pattern in his behavior. He has always walked the line between visionary and eccentric. He famously spent millions fighting the city of San Jose so he could land his private jet at night, defying curfews and sparking political controversy.
He bought nearly all of the Hawaiian island of Lanai and poured over $500 million into a grand plan to reinvent agriculture using hydroponics and renewable energy. The aim was to feed the world starting with lettuce grown on his private island. The plan flopped. Critics called it a vanity project, and the technology never scaled. Years earlier, Ellison had expressed interest in importing a MiG-29 fighter jet, the kind used by the Russian military. The US government denied the request.
All of this points to a man driven not just by ambition but by an insatiable desire to win. Whether in software, sailing, aviation, or agriculture, Ellison often enters arenas with a show of force, determined to dominate. But sometimes, as with Rising Sun, the victory turns hollow. The yacht may have been the biggest, but it could not go where he wanted, nor could it give him the spotlight he sought. In the end, he traded it for something smaller, more nimble, and more usable: Musashi, a 288-foot yacht built by Feadship, named after a legendary Japanese samurai. Musashi, unlike its predecessor, could dock in all the right harbors.
The story of Rising Sun is a cautionary tale about scale, ego, and the limits of luxury. Even for someone as wealthy and powerful as Larry Ellison, there is such a thing as too much.
