Silicon Valley's most seasoned startup CEO

    People predicted all sorts of horrors would become PeopleSoft after the takeover, but Oracle has done pretty well with it, don’t you think?

    Duffield: They’ve done a nice job. Frankly it feels good. Having spent 17 years with the company, you don’t want the product to go away, or for the customers not to enjoy the fruits of your labor.

    Bhusri: It felt very personal back then, because we were the first one for Oracle or SAP. Neither had really done big acquisitions. Fast forward and they’ve now done, collectively, 30 or 40. Looking back, it was the start of a consolidation trend that, I think, signals the end of a technology cycle. At the time that was not readily apparent.

    David, you’ve been on billionaire lists, and you’ve run quite a few companies. Usually guys with your résumé are doing venture capital, they’re in a chairman position, or they’re the CEO of something they’ve run for a long time. Rarely are they in the trenches as the CEO of a startup. Why do this?

    Duffield: Aneel and I enjoy working with each other. I had come out of retirement into a very difficult situation with the PeopleSoft takeover, got through it, and was having a good time, frankly. We just ran out of runway at PeopleSoft. Had we had another year, maybe two years, I think we would have made it. And I think I would still be at PeopleSoft today had that happened.

    But it comes down to enjoying working, for one; enjoying whom you’re working with, and having a mission. Plus, I like being a role model for my kids. Yeah, I could go rock on the back porch and do crossword puzzles – but I’ve got six kids, ages 9 to 16, and someone in the family should work. That’s me.