The next competitive advantage in golf may not be better greens, a new clubhouse or a more aggressive marketing strategy. It may be information.
Across the industry, golf operators are sitting on vast amounts of untapped data, millions of dollars in infrastructure assets and increasingly complex technology systems. The challenge is not collecting more information. The challenge is turning it into better decisions.
Innovators leading with technology are helping golf facilities do exactly that.
Some are using artificial intelligence to unlock insights hidden inside years of operational data. Others are creating digital twins of golf courses that reveal everything from irrigation lines to drainage infrastructure. Still others are helping operators connect fragmented technology systems into streamlined ecosystems that reduce administrative burdens and improve efficiency.
The common goal is simple: give owners and operators better visibility into their businesses.
To identify the people helping move the industry forward, Golf Inc. asked operators and executives a simple question: Who is truly moving the needle right now?
The answers revealed innovators focused less on flashy consumer technology and more on solving the practical challenges that determine whether a golf operation thrives.
For Robb Smyth, one of the industry’s longest-tenured technology veterans, the next frontier is not collecting more data. Golf facilities already have plenty of it. The challenge is making it usable.
Turning data into decisions
For more than three decades, Robb Smyth has watched golf operators wrestle with the same problem. The information exists, but getting meaningful answers from it is often challenging.
Smyth, co-founder of AI Partners, grew up in the golf technology business. His family’s company, Smyth Systems, was among the pioneers of club management software, serving facilities ranging from municipal courses and daily-fee operations to some of the country’s most prominent private clubs and resorts.
Throughout those years, one challenge remained consistent. Every system generated data. Few operators had an easy way to use it.
“Every club has information,” Smyth said. “The problem has always been getting meaningful answers out of the systems.”
Most golf facilities rely on multiple software platforms to run their operations. Tee sheet systems, point-of-sale software, accounting programs, payroll systems and customer databases often operate independently. As a result, answering relatively simple business questions can require hours of report generation, spreadsheet manipulation and manual analysis.
Artificial intelligence is changing that dynamic. Through AI Partners, Smyth and his team connect directly to a club’s databases and allow operators to interact with their information using natural language. Instead of building reports, users simply ask questions.
Smyth describes it as “having a conversation with your data.”
An operator might ask: What was our average green fee last July? How did weekday rounds compare with weekends? Which facilities generated the highest food and beverage revenue per round? Why did June outperform the previous year?
Instead of creating multiple reports and manually piecing together the answers, the system delivers insights in seconds.
The impact becomes significant for ownership groups and management companies overseeing multiple facilities.
Regional managers can compare locations, identify trends and evaluate performance without spending hours gathering information from various systems.
The platform can also become proactive. Operators can instruct the system to monitor specific metrics and automatically alert them when spending approaches budget thresholds or when future tee sheet occupancy falls below target levels.
For Smyth, technology is not about replacing human decision-making; it’s about removing barriers to it. The reports already exist. The answers are already there. AI simply makes them accessible.
Smyth believes the value of that accessibility will become increasingly important whenever golf’s boom begins to normalize.
“When business is good, money hides a lot of problems,” he said.
Making the invisible visible
While Smyth is helping operators unlock business intelligence, Forest King is focused on another challenge that has long existed in golf operations: understanding what lies beneath the surface.
King, director of field technology at Landscapes Unlimited, has spent much of the past decade helping golf facilities transform underground infrastructure into usable operational intelligence.
His work began with integrating GIS technology, drone mapping and 3D modeling into golf course construction projects.
Initially, the technology helped architects create more accurate designs. Over time, King realized the same tools could solve a much larger problem facing golf facilities: Millions of dollars of critical infrastructure often remain hidden underground.
Irrigation systems, drainage networks, electrical systems, utilities and fiber networks are essential to daily operations. Yet many facilities still rely on aging paper plans, static CAD drawings or institutional knowledge stored in the minds of longtime superintendents.
“When you build a golf course, millions of dollars are invested underground,” King said. “At the end of the project, the owner often receives a rolled-up set of plans, a PDF and maybe a CAD file they can’t even open.”
That disconnect led to the development of M4 FieldView, a platform designed to create living digital records of golf course infrastructure.
Using drone mapping, survey-grade positioning and GIS modeling, the platform allows staff to locate assets in the field, view specifications and continuously update infrastructure records as the property evolves.
The benefits extend well beyond convenience. Maintenance teams can troubleshoot problems faster. Superintendents can identify infrastructure without relying on memory. Owners gain a clearer understanding of assets that may represent millions of dollars in investment.
The system also addresses a growing challenge across the industry: preserving institutional knowledge.
Many superintendents spend decades learning every inch of a property. When they retire or move on, that valuable institutional knowledge often leaves with them, creating a significant gap for their successors.
King said that concern consistently emerges in conversations with operators and the response at industry trade shows has often been the same: “You have no idea how badly we need this.”
For owner-operators planning renovations, acquisitions or capital improvement projects, the implications can be significant.
Accurate infrastructure intelligence reduces uncertainty, improves budgeting and minimizes costly surprises during construction.
King believes golf facilities are gradually moving away from static documentation.
“The question is no longer just how well your property looks,” he said. “It’s how well do you understand it?”
That understanding becomes increasingly important as courses confront aging infrastructure, sustainability goals and water management challenges.
King sees the next phase involving deeper integration of sensor technology, moisture monitoring and real-time operational data.
As those technologies converge, operators gain clearer insight into operations and resource allocation.
In King’s view, golf courses are evolving into sophisticated infrastructure businesses and owner-operators that understand their assets best may gain a meaningful competitive advantage.
Connecting the modern club
If Smyth focuses on data and King focuses on infrastructure, Thomas Russell is tackling another challenge confronting golf operators: technology fragmentation.
Russell, founder of Greenside Tech, arrived in the golf industry after building technology systems for private equity-backed veterinary and dental organizations. What he discovered in golf was familiar.
Many facilities face operational challenges similar to those found in other industries, but often with fewer resources and less internal technology expertise. Operators frequently find themselves managing disconnected software platforms, multiple vendors and overlapping workflows.
The problem, Russell said, is not necessarily a lack of technology; it’s a lack of connection between technologies.
“There isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution,” he said.
Rather than forcing facilities into a single software ecosystem, Greenside Tech helps courses create standardized technology stacks built from specialized solutions that work together.
Russell compares the approach to assembling a team of experts. Each solution performs a specific task exceptionally well. The challenge is ensuring they communicate effectively with one another. The objective is straightforward: eliminate redundant work and reduce administrative burden.
One example involved a facility with onsite lodging and a separate point-of-sale system. The staff had to manage transactions across disconnected platforms. Greenside Tech built an integration that automatically transferred information between systems, eliminating duplicate work and improving efficiency.
For operators, that translates into fewer manual processes and more time focused on guests.
Russell believes the most effective technology often goes unnoticed.
“You could have the best technology in the world,” he said. “Guests are still going to remember how they felt when they visited your facility.”
That philosophy drives much of Greenside Tech’s work.
The goal is not to replace hospitality but to create technology environments that allow hospitality professionals to spend less time troubleshooting systems and more time delivering memorable experiences for members and guests.
Russell also sees data collection and customer intelligence becoming increasingly important as market conditions evolve.
Facilities that successfully capture guest information, purchasing habits and playing behavior will be better positioned to engage customers, build loyalty and drive repeat visits if demand eventually softens.
Those insights, combined with integrated technology ecosystems, can help operators create more personalized experiences while improving operational efficiency.
For many golf facilities, that combination may prove invaluable.
The competitive edge
Rather than focusing solely on consumer-facing tools, innovators are increasingly building solutions that strengthen the operational foundation of the business itself. That foundation includes understanding assets below ground. It includes unlocking insights hidden within years of operational data. And it includes simplifying the technology ecosystems that support daily operations.
For owners and operators, the lesson is clear: Technology alone will not create a successful golf facility.
But those who embrace tools that improve visibility, efficiency and decision-making may find themselves better prepared for whatever comes next and it may not be the ones golfers notice … they may be the ones quietly helping operators run better businesses every day.
AI, data and the next wave of golf technology
Artificial intelligence may dominate industry conversations, but according to Ross Liggett, founder and managing partner of Metolius Golf, the technology’s biggest impact on golf operations is still ahead.
“The explosion of AI-powered workflows, which are currently referred to as ‘agents,’ will unquestionably be the biggest trend in the next three to five years,” Liggett said.
While AI tools have become increasingly sophisticated, Liggett believes many operators have yet to see meaningful benefits because most systems still lack access to the proprietary data needed to generate useful business insights.
“I think the biggest gap is that operators have been promised that AI will be transformative, but it has not delivered on that promise,” he said.
The challenge is context. Public AI models such as ChatGPT can answer general questions, but they often lack access to the historical demand, pricing, membership and operational data that drive decisions at individual facilities.
“Efficiently and securely providing LLMs with proprietary context is the biggest missing link right now,” he said.
According to Liggett, facilities that organize their data today will be best positioned to take advantage of future AI capabilities.
“AI only works on data,” he said. “If you want AI to work for you, it needs to work on your data, not just the public data on the internet.”
He also recommends prioritizing cloud-based systems with open APIs that can integrate with emerging technologies.
“Those factors are absolutely essential to play in the future,” Liggett said.
Not every company helping shape that future is a startup. Several established golf technology providers continue to expand their capabilities and influence how facilities operate.
Among them are Noteefy, which helps operators recover revenue from canceled tee times; Tagmarshal, a leader in pace-of-play and operational analytics; Whoosh, which continues to expand its golfer engagement platform; and Gallus Golf, a longtime player in mobile communication and customer engagement.
Newer companies are also attracting attention. Loop Golf is leveraging artificial intelligence to automate customer communication, while GolfBack is focused on revenue optimization and tee-sheet performance.
Together, these companies reflect many of the industry’s biggest priorities: improving operational efficiency, maximizing revenue, enhancing the golfer experience and helping facilities make better decisions through technology.
This article originally appeared in the July/August 2026 issue of Golf Inc.