Summers’s Ouster May Be Behind Delay in Oracle CEO’s $115M Harvard Gift

SAN FRANCISCO – The turmoil at Harvard that led to the ouster of the university’s president, Lawrence Summers, contributed to an impasse over a $115 million gift promised by the CEO of Oracle Corp., Lawrence Ellison, according to published reports.A spokeswoman for Harvard, Sarah Friedell, confirmed yesterday that the billionaire software executive has not yet followed through on his pledge to set up a multi-disciplinary program to assess the effectiveness of global health programs.“The gift agreement between Harvard and Mr. Ellison has not yet been signed,” Ms. Friedell said. She referred further questions about the situation to the public health professor who oversaw negotiations about the gift, Christopher Murray. He did not respond to an e-mail message seeking comment for this article.In an interview a year ago, Mr. Ellison said the gift to Harvard was a sure thing. “It’s absolutely going to happen,” Mr. Ellison told the Wall Street Journal.A story in the San Francisco Chronicle yesterday reported that “sources familiar with the deal” attributed the delay to the contretemps over Mr. Summers. His difficulties first drew public attention early last year when arts and sciences faculty members voted no confidence in him following remarks he made suggesting that genetics were partly responsible for disparities at elite levels of math and science programs.In February, Mr. Summers resigned under pressure from Harvard’s governing board following another outbreak of discontent among faculty members.The Chronicle reported that the entrepreneur’s concerns related to Harvard’s ability to execute the global health project without the direction of Mr. Summers, a former treasury secretary and World Bank economist.It is clear Mr. Ellison was aware of Mr. Summers’s difficulties. In an interview with the Chronicle in May 2005, the software guru joked about being at Harvard soon after the faculty vote.“I spent time with Larry Summers, another fascinating guy, the day after the faculty voted to censure him. The day after was better than the day he had before,” Mr. Ellison said with a laugh, according to a transcript the newspaper posted on the Web.Mr. Ellison indicated that his gift was to be funneled through the Maryland based Ellison Medical Foundation. However, the foundation’s director, Dr. Richard Sprott, told The New York Sun yesterday that he was not involved in Mr. Ellison’s planning for the Harvard gift.“I’ve never had any discussions with him about it,” Dr. Sprott said. “It was not to go through us as far as I know.”The delay is curious in part because, according to Harvard insiders, Mr. Ellison was insisting at one juncture that his entire gift be spent in three years, with possible additional sums to follow based on performance. The speed with which the money was to be burned through made some Harvard officials, including Mr. Summers, nervous. During negotiations, Mr. Ellison reportedly agreed to add five endowed professorships, adding some long-term stability to the effort.Dr. Murray told reporters that the last contact with Mr. Ellison was in November. The Boston Herald said the physician was put off at one point by an Ellison aide, saying, “I’m sorry. He’s away on safari.”A spokeswoman for Mr. Ellison, Kimberly Pineda, did not return calls seeking comment for this article.The episode has caused consternation among some Harvard professors, particularly at the School of Public Health. In 2004, Mr. Summers asserted control over a $107 million grant scholars there won to treat AIDS in Africa. The move angered some public health faculty members whose roles were diminished.Several staffers hired to work on the “Ellison Institute of World Health” have been laid off, the Financial Times said.The dean of the public health school, Barry Bloom, complained publicly this week that officials began implementing the program before funding was guaranteed.“I hope to hell they have learned their lesson,” he told the San Jose Mercury News.

Summers’s Ouster May Be Behind Delay in Oracle CEO’s $115M Harvard Gift

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