We just got a press release.

Remington Arms Company, LLC (“Remington”) announced today that its Model RM380, an all-metal micro pistol designed for concealed carry, is now shipping and will be available at sporting goods retailers across the country on November 14, 2015. The RM380 is Remington’s first pistol designed and produced at its new Huntsville, AL facility utilizing newly installed machining centers, quality enhanced assembly lines and world class test ranges.

With a sleek, modern design, this purpose-built pistol boasts all of the latest enhancements to make it a leader in the very competitive concealed carry market. In addition to tough, all-metal construction for ultimate durability and longevity, the RM380 also features the longest barrel in its class to maximize muzzle velocity and bullet expansion while facilitating shooting precision and accuracy.

This breakthrough pistol delivers unrivaled quality and ingenuity in the micro pistol market. Weighing just 12.2 ounces unloaded and measuring just 5 ¼ inches long, the RM380 is easy for anyone to carry unobtrusively. With its extended beavertail grip, Remington’s new handgun facilitates a smooth draw, even in suboptimal conditions.

The RM380 also features a light and smooth double-action-only trigger, fully functional low profile slide stop, light slide racking force, and an ambidextrous magazine release. The replaceable grip panels allow for customization while the optimized grip angle allows for greater shootability and comfort. Remington’s history is deep with small firearms for personal protection. The RM380 returns the brand to its rightful place amongst the best in market.

The Remington Model RM380 is chambered in .380 Auto with a suggested retail price of $417.

For more information, please visit http://remingtonhandguns.com/rm380

The RM380 is based upon Shooting Illustrated’s 2005 “Handgun of the Year,” the Rohrbaugh R9.

Rohrbaugh was purchased by Remington in January of 2014, and Remington Senior Project Manager for Handguns Daniel Cox has devoted his team to making significant improvements to the R9 design, while dropping the price dramatically.

The goal of the RM380 was tweak the basic design of a $1,100 pistol—adding features—while changing manufacturing processes enough to dramatically drop the price to an MSRP of $417.

Among the changes:

• swapping the heel magazine release for a more conventional location behind the trigger guard.
• adding a slide-stop lever.
• completely changing the recoil system.
• optimize an already solid trigger system for a consistent 10 lbs DAO trigger pull.

It’s a significant amount of work for such a small pistol, but changes that were necessary to bring the gun in line for the target market.

Perhaps the most important change was the re-engineering of the recoil system. Originally quite complex with only a 250-round life expectancy, the revised system uses much fewer parts and is expected to last thousands of rounds.

The new recoil system is sprung so that it is also much easier for people with reduced hand strength to cycle.

The goal is a street price of about $379 when things settle down.

We’ve already submitted our request to get one for testing and evaluation.