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Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

reuters.com

251–260 of 344 posts

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a large overlap between any serious engineering discipline and firearms enthusiasts. The engineering and physics involved in building/tuning guns and shooting accurately is very interesting. Furthermore, the "renegade" spirit required to reject the status-quo and push the envelope in science and engineering attracts quite a few of the same types of people. Finally, the idea of "banning" guns -- which every b…

That is an interesting anecdote. Here is another - No engineers I've worked with cared about guns at all.

Potato guns?

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#252
post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some European countries have more guns than you’d think. Iirc it’s estimated that some countries like Switzerland have more guns per capita than some US states (New Jersey is usually the lowest per capita). The difference is in gun culture. Very few Europeans identify with guns as much as Americans occasionally do.

I believe gun ownership in Switzerland is very closely tied to compulsory military service. It's very much an outlier as statistics go - issuing every adult male a rifle isn't so much a gun culture as a military strategy. (Czechia does has a strong civilian ownership, however)

Finland also has a lot of guns, about 1.5mil out of a population of 5.5mil. Compare this to the 57,000 registered guns among New Jersey’s 8.8mil residents. It’s not just military service, even if that explains Switzerland specifically.

Europe is a more diverse place ideologically and socially than most Americans tend to imagine it. The place is bigger and more complex than just Paris or Berlin, just like how America is not just NY or Houston.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#253
post #161

I'd say $220 mil is a pretty good price for a company that hasn't introduced an innovative product in 50 years. Colt's main products are the AR-15 (introduced ~1963), the various 1911 models (introduced in—duh—1911), and the single action army revolvers (introduced in 1873). It must be a hell of a marketing effort to keep flogging 50–150 year old products.

Can you name any small arms manufacturer who has introduced a successful, innovative design in the past 50 years? The design space seems pretty well explored at this point.

Sig p365, ultra compact with 10 round capacity, hadn’t been done before.

Any of the suppressor manufacturers.

Ultra long range bolt guns from a variety of manufacturers (notably not Remington, colt, etc).

Several novel application PDW systems (personal defense weapon). B&T, FN, Sig, HK, and others.

Optics have rally stepped up. Always on 8 year battery life 300ft submersible red dot sights from aim point. Crazy precision scopes from vortex, nightforce, a few others.

It’s certainly a hobby that you can spend $100k on really easily exploring a variety of styles of defense and sport shooting.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course they had military might. But the point is it wasn't exactly "citizens", and whether regular citizens can bear arms has little to do with whether the standing armies of nobles can. The nobility of that period is not what I would consider regular citizens. The original assertion I replied to is obviously not as absolute as it was presented.

Sorry I wasn't very clear. I am not sure if you consider soliders to be "regular citizens" but many of the troops would have been been subjects or lower nobles. If strictly the nobility (without their troops) were going against the king he may have been able to resist if he had his own troops. I am not sure how possible it would have been to run England without the nobility so it is possible that troops were not stri…

The Monarchy, like all rulers, is able to rule because they have the backing of powerful factions. No matter how powerful you think a ruler, ultimately they have to delegate a lot of control to those they want to carry out their orders. There is no difference in any country. Even in the US, were the DoD and some other departments able to successfully coordinate, they could easily take over the government, at least for a short while. That they don't is more a nature of how problematic it would be to do anything useful after that was accomplished, and that it would likely be short lived.

My minimal understanding of the Magna Carta, as taught to an American in middle school, is that the Nobility forced the monarchy to sign a document ensuring they are subject to certain laws like others are (but not necessarily all the laws the average citizen is subject to), which in essence increased the power of the Nobility. They were able to do this because most the military might of the time was in the hands of the nobles. The Monarchy might have had a larger army than any single noble, but the combined military strength of the nobility dwarfed the Monarchy (wars were generally fought by calling on the nobility to supply soldiers).

My point was though that the loss of powers of the Monarchy in the UK had little to do with the citizens, it was a power grab by the nobility. And then I assume eventually much of the strength of the nobility was ceded to parliament and then parliament was eventually opened to commoners (I'm getting into speculation here, but speculation based on snippets of history I do know so I think is likely not far off the mark).

In the end, the ability of the citizens to have guns specifically had very little to do with it I think. AIUI, there are other countries with mostly figurehead monarchies which I suspect had a more gradual shift in power as well, and wasn't explicitly at the threat of violence. It may have been spurred by the sight of that happening in other countries, but really that's more a realization that the populace is learning that they have power in quantity, guns or not, and those ruling them needed to contend with that reality.

Attributing it all to guns is a vast oversimplification in my eyes. It may have had far more to do with the printing press.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>There is a large overlap between any serious engineering discipline and firearms enthusiasts. Again, surely you mean in the US ? All engineers I have ever worked with or met are almost the exact opposite of this. IMHO ;-)

Some European countries have more guns than you’d think. Iirc it’s estimated that some countries like Switzerland have more guns per capita than some US states (New Jersey is usually the lowest per capita). The difference is in gun culture. Very few Europeans identify with guns as much as Americans occasionally do.

I am betting that 90% of those are hunting rifles, and the overlap between computer geeks and people who hunt these days is pretty low based on my personal experience.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#256
post #102

Honest question: How is this relevant to Hacker News? As a non-American i was rather bewildered to find this here. Is there a serious overlap between gun enthusiasts and the IT community in the US?

Early computers were created to calculate ballistic tables for artillery fire support in military.

Most of the innovations in computers and tech are direct results from military arms research.

Silicon Valley didn’t just sprout from nothing. There were lots of engineers in the area that worked to support military contract making weapons, and their kids started computer companies.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#257
post #102

Honest question: How is this relevant to Hacker News? As a non-American i was rather bewildered to find this here. Is there a serious overlap between gun enthusiasts and the IT community in the US?

There is a large overlap between any serious engineering discipline and firearms enthusiasts. The engineering and physics involved in building/tuning guns and shooting accurately is very interesting. Furthermore, the "renegade" spirit required to reject the status-quo and push the envelope in science and engineering attracts quite a few of the same types of people. Finally, the idea of "banning" guns -- which every b…

> Finally, the idea of "banning" guns -- which every basically qualified engineer or physicist should be capable to building from readily available materials and tools -- makes them even more interesting. If for no other reason than to illuminate preposterous and insulting nature of the idea.

This makes no sense. Assaulting someone is illegal, but anyone can do it. It's still illegal.

What?

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sig's recent P320 system is another obvious example, where they've completely modularized the fire control group, allowing that to be swapped freely between multiple grips, calibers, and even form factors.

Yeah but that's only made convenient by dumb laws.

Vouched for this as it's a good point for anyone who understands the P320 FCU and the legal framework which inspired its creation.

The FCU concept would still have value were the legal framework less Byzantine, but its practical benefits would be significantly diminished.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#260
post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Glock is a fairly obvious one.

The Glock 17 was introduced 39 years ago, not quite 50 years but still. It's also worth pointing out that while the manufacturing techniques used by Glock were new the actual design is essentially identical to the browning hi-power.

For the unfamiliar, the Heckler & Koch VP70 was the first polymer frame, striker-fired pistol, and predated the Glock by 12 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler_%26_Koch_VP70

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