[JoongAng Ilbo] GOLFZON: Screen Sports Powered by VR and AR Already Worth KRW 5 Trillion

JoongAng Ilbo reported that Korea’s simulation sports market, which stood at around KRW 100 billion in 2007, grew to KRW 5 trillion last year, expanding roughly 50-fold over a decade. Screen golf has been the driving force behind the popularity of simulation sports, with GOLFZON ranking first at a 60% market share, while the screen golf population was found to have increased by 660,000 from the previous year to 3.51 million. The report added that the screen golf market has grown to KRW 1.02 trillion annually, and that 85.5% of new golfers with two or fewer years of experience had used screen golf venues.

JoongAng Ilbo reported that, following screen golf, simulation sports are expanding into a variety of disciplines such as screen baseball, bowling, horse riding, and fishing, and that services combined with VR and AR technologies are also emerging one after another. The report noted that GOLFZON has developed screen golf that combines 3D graphics with VR, invests 5–10% of its revenue in R&D, and is accelerating its expansion into overseas markets.

JoongAng Ilbo reported that experts emphasized that developing realistic technologies and creating international markets are key to the future growth of the simulation sports industry, and forecast that the spillover effects will grow even greater through convergence with various fields such as education and medicine.