Sinclair and the 'Sunrise' Technology: The Deconstruction of a Myth by Ian Adamson & Richard Kennedy

Author:Ian Adamson & Richard Kennedy [Adamson, Ian & Kennedy, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Technology & Engineering, Business, Economics, General, Biography & Autobiography, Electronics, Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780140087741
Google: MDRaAAAACAAJ
Amazon: 0140087745
Publisher: Penguin Books
Published: 1986-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

[8] THE QUANTUM LEAP: TO WHERE?

The massive success of the ZX81 and the Spectrum had given Sinclair Research the top sellers in a rapidly expanding market. The rewards for such success, allied to Sir Clive’s cost-cutting expertise and the massive percentage mark-up that mail-order sales provide, are apparent in the profit figures, the year ending March 1983 producing profits of nearly £14m on a turnover of just over £54m March 1984 showed a lower percentage profit, reflecting the Micro-vision costs and retail merchandising, with the increased turnover of £77m providing only the same profit. However, in anyone’s terms this was good business. Rothschild and Sons placed 10 per cent of the company equity with a group of financial institutions in January of 1983 for a price of £13.6m at the same time, it was announced that the company would seek a share placement, either on the unlisted securities market or on the Stock Exchange, some time in 1984.

As well as rewarding himself with a £1m bonus on top of his salary for the year ending March 1982 (he needed the money for his £400,000 Knightsbridge mansion), Sinclair had now cashed in some of his corporate chips, at what in hindsight looks like a very well-chosen point. The notional value of £136m that this gave Sinclair Research was not a realistic assessment, based as it was on a rapidly saturating market in the UK. The rise of Sinclair as a household name had gone together with the micro mania that had produced the highest percentage of homes with micros in the world. In 1982 over 500,000 home computers were sold in the UK, 220,000 of them ZX81s, and 75,000 of them Spectrums. While the 1983 market was estimated at 600,000 machines, sustainable growth in the computer market would require new products. While Sinclair, secure in his visionary zeal, undoubtedly believed that the latest version of the pocket television would sell ‘zillions’, despite the decidedly lukewarm reception previous incarnations had met with, few shared his faith in this as the replacement cash generator for Sinclair Research.

Sinclair had defined the new wonder product that would keep the computers rolling off the lines, and the contortions of his team as they struggled to flesh out the contours of his vision are the main focus of this chapter. Although it owed little to any activity on the part of Sinclair himself, it owed much to the legacy of his hand-picked team as they followed in the master’s footsteps.

The supposed Quantum Leap in computing power after which the Sinclair QL was named apparently had more to do with the chaos of quantum unpredictability than the orderly behaviour of large numbers of particles. The QL - ‘sheer professional power in the special Sinclair style’ as the glossy brochure had it - was ‘launched’ in January of 1984. Expectations in the computer press were high, with persistent rumours about the ‘ZX83’ having been circulating more or less since the Spectrum appeared. When it finally arrived, having become the

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