With all the perfectly fine weapons available to Europe's elite police, military, and spook agencies (and the rare citizen allowed to own handguns), Sphinx of Switzerland makes handguns demanded by just about all the elite units. "If it ain't Sphinx, your weapon stinks".
It looks suspiciously like a CZ 75B compact (I'd call it "midsize", myself) because Sphinx has patent arrangements from CZ. Find the perfect lily, gild it, and double the price. When the taxpayer foots the bill, the sky's the limit. Note the family resemblance.
Both brand-marked types of magazines, as well as OEM, are made by Mec-Gar, are perfectly interchangeable, and are all priced at the exact-same price of the now-common $30-some dollars (ouch). The handgun on top is the still-uncatalogued CZ 75B Compact-L from the CZ Custom Shop, but still less expensive than the Sphinx.
So expensive, nobody had bought any Sphinx yet, although a lot of sighs were generated.
I was sighing at it, along with Mike, the owner's son. Al, the owner, walked up to us, and said he just got off the phone with Kriss, USA, the importer. The company admitted it wasn't selling much, and decided to sacrifice some of their profit margin for more sales volume. Al said they offered a $600 rebate on every item still on back order, and he jumped at it.
He said he's getting a credit on the one he already had in the store, and asked me if I'd be interested if he knocked off $600. I readily agreed after I picked myself off the floor, which explains why I have a test target of my first rounds with the Sphinx.
And while I'm no elite shooter, I have enough experience with this platform now to spot the difference. A lot of handwork goes into these guns, just like customized CZ models. And there are several gee-whiz features inside the Sphinx that exceeds even the custom CZ. It makes the weapon slightly more accurate, slightly easier-shooting, and much snootier. No wonder the leet operators insist on it, especially if somebody else pays for it. It's also standard equipment among the personal guard of lots of Arab oil royalty.