'Smart Gun' Needs Time, Money Michael Recce, who dreamed up the concept of a pressure-sensor handgrip that would allow only the handgun’s owner to pull the trigger, says that development of a commercial model is slowed by time and money. The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that the New Jersey Institute of Technology has developed a prototype, but says that commercialization is up to five years away. Eventual production would activate a 2002 New Jersey law requiring that within three years of commercialization of “smart guns,” all handguns sold in the state must be personalized with this or some other recognition technology.