Larry Ellison added two Nobu restaurants to his Hawaiian island but nixed affordable housing, leaving locals priced out: report

• Oracle founder Larry Ellison added two Nobu restaurants since buying Lanai, Bloomberg reported.
• He promised to revitalize the island's economy, but residents say they've been priced out.

After Oracle founder Larry Ellison bought almost all the land on the Hawaiian island of Lanai for $300 million a decade ago, his first major project was opening a branch of the high-end Japanese restaurant Nobu, according to a Bloomberg report.

In the years since, a second Nobu has opened on the island, but many local residents whose families have lived on Lanai for generations have left, according to the report.

A 150-unit affordable housing complex promised to residents for years was also canned by Ellison's holding company, Pulama.

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About 3,200 people live on Lanai, the smallest inhabited Hawaiian island, where tourism is the main industry.

Ellison, who founded software giant Oracle and is worth about $95 billion, according to Forbes, moved to the island full-time in 2020.

He also spent $75 million upgrading the Four Seasons resort on the island, where rooms can cost thousands of dollars a night, Bloomberg reported.

All properties available to buy in Lanai City are billed as vacation homes with seven-figure price tags.

One local who cannot afford to buy a property on the island told Bloomberg: "My biggest worry, worst-case scenario, is that the island becomes this playground for only the rich."

A news clip of Ellison promised to help the local economy on Lanai is now a running joke among its residents, according to the report.

He said in an interview with The New York Times that he saw Lanai becoming "the first economically viable, 100% green community."

Pulama is planning to build a desalination plant on the island, according to Bloomberg.

However, a seventh-generation resident who represents Lanai on a marine sanctuary advisory council, said his requests to speak to Ellison have been been repeatedly ignored.

Ellison did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.