Athena by GolfNow: A Double-Edged Sword in Golf Course Management?

GolfNow, apparently no longer operating with the NBC Sports Next brand, has introduced Athena, a sophisticated revenue management tool named after the goddess of war, promising to revolutionize pricing strategies in golf course management. Today's press release announced, "GolfNow will Showcase Athena Technology This Week at 2025 PGA Show in Orlando," signaling a new era in how golf courses might handle revenue optimization. However, the broader implications of how GolfNow operates within the industry have sparked a conversation about ethics, fairness, and legality in the use of market data. See full press release HERE

Understanding GolfNow's Ecosystem: GolfNow serves three distinct groups within the golf industry:

1. Technology Clients: Golf courses that purchase GolfNow's operational and payments technology, including digital tee sheets and integrated point-of-sale systems.
2. Service Subscribers: A subset of these clients who pay additional fees for services like revenue management and marketing, which now includes Athena.
3. Marketplace Participants: Thousands of courses that do not use GolfNow's technology or services but list their tee times for sale on the GolfNow tee time marketplace.

All these groups contribute to a vast data pool where GolfNow has insight into:

• Pricing decisions for millions of tee times.
• Unsold tee times and their pricing.
• Purchase patterns, including how far in advance tee times are booked.

Athena's Role and Ethical Concerns: GolfNow says Athena harnesses this data through machine learning and AI to offer predictive and prescriptive pricing.

Here are the concerns that arise:

• Data Advantage: By knowing the pricing strategies and outcomes across numerous courses, GolfNow could theoretically use this information to benefit its paying Athena clients over non-subscribers or even against competing courses.
• Market Manipulation: If Athena's pricing suggestions are based on competitor data, it could lead to what some might perceive as market manipulation, where only those with access to GolfNow's insights can optimize pricing effectively.
• Fairness and Competition: There's a question of whether it's fair for GolfNow to use collective data to favor certain clients, potentially leading to an imbalance where smaller or non-subscriber courses are at a disadvantage.
• Legal Implications: The use of such comprehensive data for pricing might brush up against antitrust laws if it's perceived as creating or maintaining an unfair market advantage. Interestingly, GolfNow waited to go public with Athena until the day Lina Khan, the former Commissioner of the United States Federal Trade Commission, lost her job.

Potential Benefits: Despite these concerns, Athena offers:

• Revenue Optimization: Courses using Athena could see increased profitability through more sophisticated pricing strategies. As Todd Triplett, Senior Vice President of GolfNow, stated, "Athena will be a game-changer in golf revenue management, allowing our system to learn and adapt faster, and deliver increasingly accurate prescriptive pricing over time."
• Operational Efficiency: Automating pricing decisions reduces manual workload on course staff.
• Enhanced Golfer Experience: Dynamic pricing could make golf more accessible, adjusting prices to encourage play during off-peak times.

Critical Reflection: While Athena is undoubtedly innovative, its deployment raises significant ethical questions:

• Transparency: How transparent is GolfNow about the data it uses to inform Athena's decisions?
• Data Security and Privacy: What measures are in place to ensure that proprietary data from one course isn't used to the advantage of another?
• Industry Health: Is this technology fostering a healthy, competitive environment, or is it skewing the market in favor of GolfNow's clients?

Attempt to Gain Insight: We reached out to GolfNow for comment about Athena several days ago, after receiving a tip that this press release was forthcoming. We sought to ask questions about the tool's implications but did not receive a response from GolfNow. Additionally, we mentioned Athena in a podcast we recorded on Friday, January 17th with General Manager Martin Ort. Martin shared he recently decided to pull his family golf course, Desert Canyon, off the GolfNow marketplace.

Conclusion: Athena by GolfNow could be seen as a revolutionary tool in the golf industry, but its implications on market dynamics are complex. Industry participants, regulators, and consumers need to scrutinize how such technology affects competition, data ethics, and the spirit of fair play in golf. As Athena makes its debut at the 2025 PGA Show, these discussions will be crucial in shaping its acceptance and regulation within the industry.