Interview with SIG's CEO Ron Cohen: Wins, Controversies, and Drones?

I own Sig firearms, I go to Sig events, I've taken armorer classes for the 320 and 365 and the idea that these guns simply go off by themselves (post Sig-fixes, bought in 2024) is utter nonsense. So what I'm about to say is not coming from a "Sig hater." This is coming from someone who wants Sig to thrive.

Cohen's answer about beta testing was terrible. He sounded like an elitist. Maybe he is an elitist, maybe not. I don't know. It would have been nice to hear him talk about this one subject at length. Don't treat your rank and file customers like peons. The 320 and 365 had legit, engineering issues. Sig fixed them. But it is incomprehensible to me that Sig has not only NOT fixed the perception problem, they don't even care to try - nor did he assure anyone that the company will bend over backwards to try to avoid that crap in the future. Did anyone come away from this interview and think - oh yeah, next time Sig comes out with a new model (heck, even a current model variation), I'm gonna be first in line. Am I gonna be first in line? Hell no. I carry a 365XL every day, and I trust that gun with my life. But that trust didn't come until more than a year after the XL was released.

You ain't making iPhones, dude. You're making weapons that can kill. Stop being snobs about it, show a little humility.

Cohen is genius for Sig and them making profits, he plays the gun mob wonderfully. However what's great for Sig profits, isn't always great for the consumer. Let's be honest, no one out there is releasing as much new, evolutionary product as Sig does, not even close. Ammo, electro-optics, new gun designs etc. Their marketing hype is amazing, the Legion "club" letting people pay to be in the elite limited "club" was genius. The fact they charge prices for parts and platforms that are higher than some pure custom options and customers pay it, is amazing for their bottom line. You simply can't argue their business model is amazing, but it's amazing for profits, not for civilian customers. It's also very clear from the interview that Cohen does not care, especially now that they have Mil/LEO contracts. His only defense seems to be repeatedly stating how many military and LEO contracts they have. Let's not forget the winners of military/LEO contracts are not the best product, they are the cheapest acceptable product. Likely the biggest reason they won with the M17 is the product passed the tests and their bid price was far lower than anyone else's.

That said, all that innovation and product replacement comes at a cost, and that cost is obsolesce and a much higher rate of design/product issues. Almost every major release they've had, had serious design issues that should have been obvious if any significant product testing was done. We're not talking about odd issues that show up after 10,000 rounds, these are things consumers were noticing out of the gate.

Let's go through some of Sig's greatest hits in the last few years.

MPX: Major revisions needed in the first year. The recoil cycle is so violent even hardened AR 9mm triggers get destroyed. Failed barrel retaining bolts, failed extractors. Major upper mods were needed after a year or so. The only way Geissele could get a MPX trigger to last is give people 50% higher recoil springs. So many generation changes that multiple times Sig has not been able to get me the correct version of replacement parts. They are horrible surpassed because of the amount of gas funneled back to your face. Let's not forget all the promises of .357/.40/.45 caliber kits Sig never produced.

MCX: Same issue with extremely violent cycle rates. Lots of accuracy issues reported, generational updates so fast no one can keep up. Replacement parts prices that make custom top end parts look cheap. $800 barrels, $200 bolts, $400 bolt carriers, $400 recoil assemblies........all for a gun that Sig only guarantees will hold 4 MOA. In 2024 an AR that can only do 4 MOA is an embarrassment. The fact Sig can convince people to spend $3000 for a 4 MOA AR, and be happy about it, is nothing short of amazing. Carrier assembly recalls, they had to change the bolt design in Gen 1 so much that you could not run a Virtus barrel without buying a new bolt.

320/M17: The drop safety has been beaten to death, the Military made them fix it, but they didn't update the civilian models until they got bad PR for it in the public. The first P320 X-five was horrible. Its front/rear sight heights were so badly selected that in order to zero the gun you had to raise the rear sight so high the rear sight assemblies were coming apart since the elevation screw was running out of thread. In addition the recoil spring rate was so badly selected that it wasn't strong enough to reliably chamber a round, but the rate increased so fast it would not cycle/strip a round reliably. Pretty much everyone running them quickly dumped the factory recoil spring setup for a solid rod that could run 1911 springs. You were forced into a proprietary optic mount that fit nothing but their own red dots.

P210 US: Lots of broken recoil rods when they first started coming out. No idea if they ever fixed it.

P365: Heavy primer swipe and functioning issues, striker problems. Lots of function issues, which to be fair isn't uncommon in a very small platform.

It's unfortunate that we didn't see him being asked some hard questions. Such as why Sig waited so long to incorporate the safety features identified during military testing into their civilian models. Why do they feel that the best accuracy their $3000 AR platforms like the MCX etc. can do is 4 MOA? Funny part is, if this was supposed to be an opportunity for Sig to address some of the complaints about them, all they really did was reinforce that those complaints are indeed accurate, and they just don't care.