Veteran technology executive Mark Hurd, until last month one of Oracle Corp.’s chief executives, died early this morning, a month after taking a leave of absence for undisclosed health reasons. He was 62. 

Oracle founder, Executive Chairman and Chief Technology Officer Larry Ellison shared the news in an internal email to employees. “Mark was my close and irreplaceable friend, and trusted colleague,” he wrote. “Oracle has lost a brilliant and beloved leader who personally touched the lives of so many of us during his decade at Oracle. All of us will miss Mark’s keen mind and rare ability to analyze, simplify, and solve problems quickly.”

Ellison appointed Hurd to serve as a CEO together with Safra Catz in 2014, four years after the executive first joined the database maker as president. Hurd previously held the top post at Hewlett-Packard Co., the predecessor to Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. and HP Inc. He more than doubled HP’s stock price during his five-year tenure but left under controversial circumstances involving a relationship with a female contractor.

Hurd led a total of three different companies during his long tech industry career. Before HP and Oracle, he held the top post at NCR Corp., a publicly traded ATM manufacturer, where he worked his way up to CEO from a junior salesman.

“Mark Hurd was a world-class exec, very demanding and a clear communicator,” said longtime analyst Dave Vellante, co-CEO of SiliconANGLE Media. “He had HP on a consistently profitable trajectory. Wall Street loved him.”

After Hurd arrived at Oracle, Vellante said, he retooled Oracle’s sales force and tapped David Donatelli, who worked for Hurd at HP after a long career with EMC Corp., to shore up product marketing. “Hurd significantly contributed to Oracle’s success during his tenure,” Vellante said. “What a loss for Oracle and the industry.”

“Hurd was a hard-charging executive who expected as much from himself as his people,” added Patrick Moorhead, president and principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy. “He was financially adept and was legendary for spotting one cell in a spreadsheet of thousands that had issues.”

In 2016, less than a year and a half after Hurd became CEO with Catz, the executive sat down for an hourlong interview with SiliconANGLE Media co-CEO John Furrier on theCUBE video studio. He shared his perspectives on the technology business as well as insight into day-to-day operations at Oracle.

“We can do a lot of things at the same time,” Hurd said when asked about his work with Catz and Ellison. “I’ve been a CEO multiple times and I can tell you it’s a lonely job, it’s a hard job and it has a lot of responsibilities associated with it,” he said. “The fact you can get a team that brings with it different skills, different capabilities and the right personalities that blend together – that’s a blessing.”

Hurd is survived by a wife and two daughters.

Photo: Robert Hof/SiliconANGLE