Sinclair Research worried that Clive Sinclair himself was using his own personal wealth to fund his inventions. By 1990 the company's entire staff had been reduced to just Sinclair himself, a salesman/administrator, and an R&D employee. By 1997 only Sinclair himself was working at his company. In 1992, the "Zike" electric bicycle was released, Sinclair's second attempt at changing people's means of transport. It had a maximum speed of , and was only available by mail order. Much like the C5, the "Zike" was a commercial failure, and sold only 2,000 units. In 1999 Sinclair released the world's smallest radio, in the
Clive Sinclair (author) published in 1973 by Allison and Busby. As he said in a 2012 interview: "The truth is I’ve always been a short story writer rather than a novelist. "Bibliosexuality" was originally a collection of short stories about a certain David Drollkind. Margaret Busby said she would publish it, if I could find a way of linking them. That’s how it became a novel." Sinclair went on to become better known as a writer of short stories, with his next book, the 1981 collection "Hearts of Gold", winning him the Somerset Maugham Award. In 1983, he was recognised in "Granta"′s list