Sir Clive Sinclair, founder of Sinclair Research and creator of the highly popular affordable ZX Spectrum home computers, died at the age of 81, his daughter, Belinda has said.
The visionary inventor, who developed and manufactured portable TVs and electric vehicles before they became popular and commercially successful, passed away after suffering from a long illness, his daughter revealed.
"He was a rather amazing person. Of course, he was so clever and he was always interested in everything", his daughter told The Guardian.
Sinclair started his career as a technical journalist, leaving school, but soon founded his first company, which created the first compact calculators. But it was the ZX 80 and ZX Spectrum computers that brought him fame. They became one of the first broadly available home computers and the first in the UK to cost just under 100 pounds (around $551 in modern prices). Despite having limited capabilities compared to modern machines, at the time the ZX series computers enjoyed high popularity due to being the first affordable home computers.
For his contributions to science and the UK economy, the Queen awarded Sinclair a knighthood in 1983. However, the ZX would be his last commercial hit, which nonetheless earned him 14 million pounds in profit in just a couple of years. His later inventions, such as the C5 electric trike and the portable TV80, were not commercially successful.