KT to create 10th pro baseball team

SUWON (Yonhap News) -- South Korean telecom giant KT Corp. said Tuesday it will sponsor an expansion baseball team here in Gyeonggi Province.

KT has signed on to launch the 10th club in the Korea Baseball Organization in the city of Suwon, just south of Seoul, with an eye on joining the top league by 2015.

Lee Suk-chae, the chairman of KT, said the company will try to revitalize the local economy and incorporate its latest information and communications technologies into the sport to create new content for fans.

“Baseball has truly become a national pastime,” Lee said.

“We’ve decided to sponsor the 10th club, thanks to great support from the city of Suwon and the province of Gyeonggi.”

The KBO, which started in 1982, currently has eight teams, all of which are owned and operated by private firms. Owners include major conglomerates, such as Samsung, SK and LG.

The league broke the single-season attendance records for the fourth consecutive season this year, and has seen its attendance figures rise in each of the past six seasons. It will welcome in a ninth club, called the NC Dinos, for the 2013 season.

The Dinos, owned by game company NC, will be based in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province, about 400 kilometers southeast of Seoul.

Since the expansion to nine teams was finalized in March of this year, there have been calls for a 10th club to give the KBO an even number of teams.

Proponents of another expansion team have said having 10 clubs would reduce scheduling headaches and would further promote baseball in different corners of the country as the game‘s popularity is at an all-time high.

Suwon had been competing with a consortium of four cities and towns in North Jeolla Province -- Jeonju, Gunsan, Iksan and Wanju -- since last year to host the 10th team. With the North Jeolla cities unable to partner with a corporate sponsor, Suwon appears to have taken the lead in the race.

Both Suwon and North Jeolla have been home to now-defunct KBO teams: the Hyundai Unicorns and the Ssangbangwool Raiders, respectively.

When the Unicorns folded under financial hardships in 2007, KT was seen as a likely candidate to step in as a new corporate sponsor. The company pulled out of the plan, however, and a local tobacco firm named Woori Tobacco came in to found the Heroes. They have since become the Nexen Heroes, under the sponsorship of tire company Nexen.

Under their partnership with KT, Gyeonggi Province and Suwon agreed to renovate the 14,465-seat Suwon Stadium to turn it into a 25,000-seat stadium, and lease the ballpark to KT for 25 years.

The telecom company will have the naming right to the stadium and will also be guaranteed revenues from advertising and concessions.