Online Game Developer To Own Korean Baseball Team

An article in The Korea Herald states: "The Korea Baseball Organization on Tuesday gave the green light to NCsoft Corps., the game developer, to begin work on founding the ninth club in the top-division baseball league in South Korea. The expansion team will be based in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province, about 400 kilometers southeast of Seoul and could join the KBO as early as 2013".

It continued: "The decision was reached at a board of directors meeting attended by KBO commissioner You Young-koo and presidents from the existing eight KBO clubs. At the previous board meeting in January, the officials had approved the expansion in principle while withholding their decision on the ownership of a new team. It will be the KBO's first expansion since 1991".

Qualifications for starting a team are to "either have at least 100 billion won ($90.5 million) in net profits or to record a net income to stockholders' equity ratio of more than 10 percent". All eight teams in the Korea Baseball Organization are owned and operated by private companies.

NCsoft, headquartered in Seoul, is described as one of the world's premier publishers and developers of massively multiplayer online games, including such popular franchises as City of Heroes, Guild Wars and Lineage.