 The SIG Sauer handgun first appeared around 1975 after the Swiss company Schweizerische Industrie Gesellschaft (Swiss Industrial Company, or SIG) developed a new type of industrial production machinery known then as an automatic screw machine.This was an automated type of milling machine which could perform several machining operations without a great deal of human input.Today that machine is referred to as a Swiss type of CNC (computer numerical control) machine.