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Oracle boss's GBP55m gift to charity to settle lawsuit(Evening Standard Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) ORACLE cofounder Larry Ellison has begun settling an insidertrading lawsuit with a $100 million (GBP55 million) donation to his non-profit medical foundation, but there is still no sign of the $115 million he pledged to Harvard University last year. A legal settlement of a civil complaint about a $900 million gain made by Ellison from selling some of his Oracle stock shortly before the software company's shares plummeted in 2001 involved the unusual payment to his charitable foundation. Ellison denied any wrongdoing in the lawsuit, but agreed to donate the money to charity in Oracle's name and pay $22 million in Oracle shareholders' legal costs. A special committee appointed by Oracle's board to investigate the allegations raised in the lawsuit also concluded that Ellison did nothing wrong. The settlement comes as Harvard University officials are cutting staff of the planned Ellison Institute for World Health because the gift the billionaire pledged to the school has not yet turned up. Neither Dr Christopher Murray, the Harvard researcher who was to head Harvard's proposed Ellison Institute for World Health, nor Oracle would comment on the pledge today. |