Virtual Reality Golf Takes Off in Korea

Nearly 300,000 Koreans play virtual golf regularly, and Golfzon, one of the country's fastest-growing companies, is enjoying the trend

JUNG YEON-JE/AFP/Getty Images

By Moon Ihlwan

At 6:30 p.m. on a Friday, Park Sang Pil and three of his colleagues at South Korea's BCcard rush to play a round of golf together. Although their tee time is just 10 minutes away, they still haven't decided on which course they will be playing. Not to worry: With just the click of a mouse, they can choose from more than 50 courses, including the Old Course at St. Andrews in Scotland (BusinessWeek.com, 7/11/08) and Pebble Beach in California. That's because Park and his pals are playing just a block from their downtown Seoul office, at Lemon Screen Golf Café. At the café, the foursome swing real clubs to hit real golf balls into a wall-size screen displaying virtual reality fairways.

Virtual golfing is hot in Korea. Park is one of nearly 300,000 South Koreans regularly playing 18-hole rounds at "screen golf cafés" that have been mushrooming in the country in the past couple of years. "Screen golf is great," says the 30-year-old assistant manager at the credit-card company. "It doesn't matter if it's hot or cold, rains or snows; you don't have to spend all day to play a round of golf; you can play it at night—and most of all, it is cheap."

That's music to the ears of Kim Wonil, chief operating officer of Golfzon, one of Korea's fastest-growing companies. Kim, 33, reckons by the end of this year there will be about 3,000 golf cafés across the country operating a total of 12,000 simulators, more than half made by Golfzon. "The growth potential is enormous," says Kim, one of the finalists in BusinessWeek's annual search) for the best young entrepreneurs in Asia.

Satisfying the Pent-Up Demand for Golf

Back in 2000, Kim and his 61-year-old father, Kim Young Chan, set up Golfzon to make computer simulators targeting golf novices who are trying to get the hang of the sport without having to splurge on exorbitantly expensive country club memberships and greens fees. Today the company has emerged as the world's largest provider of hardware and software for virtual reality golf, with projected revenues of some $77 million in 2008, more than triple its $23 million in sales from last year. (Earnings for 2007 were $9.2 million but the company declines to give its profit forecast for this year.)

The dramatic growth underscores the pent-up demand for the sport long associated with the rich and privileged in Korea. It costs about $250 for a real-world golfer to play a round, but tee times are hard to secure and memberships for many country clubs fetch more than half a million dollars. A round of 18-hole virtual golf costs $15 to $25.

Using a simulator for golfing (BusinessWeek.com, 3/18/08) isn't new. For years it has been around mainly as a teaching tool at golf clinics or as a rich man's toy. But in Korea—as advances in simulation technology enable it to replicate every fairway detail of coveted courses—virtual reality golf has quickly become a cheap alternative for many who can't afford to play on outdoor courses. In the U.S. numerous public golf courses charge each player $25 or less, whereas in Korea public courses are scarce and they aren't much cheaper than those run privately.

Technology for virtual sports keep evolving, too. "A couple of years ago, screen golf was mostly for fun, although you could improve your course management skills," says Yoon Dong Wook, a middle-aged salary man who took a $15 lunch-hour package at Lemon Screen Golf Café that offers a nine-hole round plus lunch. "Now I come here as much for practice as for fun," Yoon says as his mat tilts downward for a second shot to replicate a downhill slope on which his ball lies.