Jeff Ma has never been one to accept the status quo. He’s always sought solutions or ways to make better decisions through data and analytics, whether it was as a member of the MIT Blackjack Team in the mid-90’s that inspired the book ‘Bringing Down the House,’ as the founder of a variety of sports-focused websites, or as a VP with Microsoft, where he recruited startups to use the company’s technologies.

Now, Ma has brought his skills to golf, where he’s helped the world’s biggest golf management company – Troon – launch a new suite of digital products aimed at improving operational efficiency for golf operators while enhancing the booking and benefits experience for golfers.

“I just saw a big opportunity for someone like Troon to really change the landscape as it pertains to how technology is used to drive revenue for golf courses,” Ma said in an interview. “At the same time, I saw a really big opportunity to build a consumer brand or consumer property in the digital mobile space that centered around a new booking experience, but also the best rewards and loyalty program in golf.”

Like millions of other Americans, the 51-year-old Ma discovered a new level of passion for golf after the pandemic hit.

Realizing he had few pursuits outside of family and work, Ma went from playing the game two to three times a year — “really a hack,” as he describes it – to carving out more time to enjoy golf with friends and trying to get better.

“I’m still not very good, but at least a lot better than I was, and I find it to be a really important thing in my life because there’s not a lot of things where you can step away for four or five hours and talk to your friends, be off devices, for the most part, and just enjoy yourself,” said Ma, who’s married and has two young boys.

“As I did that, there were two things that were a little bit of a convergence,” he added. “One, there was this passion for this hobby that I was developing. And two, I was looking at it from the standpoint of an entrepreneur that started four companies before, and I just thought that there was this big opportunity. The more that I’ve been in this and meeting people in golf, I really do believe there’s huge technology opportunity. But the challenge is it’s so fragmented. It’s hard to make a business out of it. That’s why doing this with Troon is the important piece that was missing.”

Troon’s New Division

A native of the Bay Area in California, Ma co-founded sports technology companies such as PROTRADE and Citizen Sports, the latter of which was acquired by Yahoo! in 2010. He also founded TenXer, which was sold to Twitter (now X) in 2015, spent time with ESPN as a predictive analytics expert, and has been a part of the Moneyball movement in professional sports as a consultant for teams such as the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers and NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers.

For many, Ma is best known as being the inspiration for the main character in the best-selling book ‘Bringing Down the House’ as well as the movie ‘21’ given his role in the successful card counting techniques and other strategies the MIT Blackjack Team employed to beat casinos at blackjack worldwide.

Living in the Bay Area, Ma was able to meet some of the leadership involved with TPG Capital, the private equity platform that in 2021 made a significant strategic investment in Troon along with Rory McIlroy’s Symphony Ventures Group. The investment was specifically geared toward accelerating growth and providing resources to clients and partners, including the 620 golf and leisure facilities that Troon works with globally to provide operational, management and advisory services.

Among those Ma shared his vision with was TPG Capital Partner Paul Hackwell, who lived in the same town. Ma joined Troon as a consultant a little over a year ago, helping devise a strategy for what they should be doing and investing in technology-wise, and pitched the concept of Troon Digital, the newly launched subsidiary that Ma now runs as Chief Digital Officer.

“Mostly it’s around the idea of building these technologies and these tools,” said Ma. “So, we have been kind of in a little bit of what startups would call ‘stealth mode,’ where we’ve kind of been building the tools and taking over the booking engines and booking experience for many of the courses.”

This week, Troon went live with its new Troon Access program that replaces the Troon Card loyalty program that had been popular among golfers at the state, regional and national level for almost three decades.

The new, consolidated platform is a national subscription program that allows golfers to get notable discounts – at over 150 affiliated Troon facilities in the U.S. — in addition to receiving other benefits from retailers, including exclusive partner offers from companies like Ship Sticks and Avis.

Paradigm Changes

For course operators, Troon’s goal is providing tools to drive more revenue, whether it’s marketing, selling or pricing inventory.

Ma says the current model for many facilities is to lower prices when they see demand is soft during a certain period, but with few channels to let customers know they’ve been lowered, there’s often a reliance on antiquated methods. Some might have local card or discount programs that offer highly discounted golf within a short window – within three days, for example – and Ma says that’s ultimately “training golfers to wait to book,” rather than allowing them to reserve tee times when they want to at a reasonable price.

“We’re working on basic e-commerce tools that automate around understanding a golfer; understanding their tendencies, when they want to play, what their buying decisions are based on,” Ma said. “In other words, if we know someone typically books during the week as a single, we can let them know by email, by text or through an in-app notification that there is availability during the week in times they normally would play. Or if we know someone is less price sensitive and likes to play during the weekends we can give them opportunities to book as a foursome during the weekend, maybe earlier than everyone else does. So, there’s a lot of things that courses can do that they’re not doing right now.”

From the golfer standpoint, Ma’s mission with Troon Digital is to make the experience of booking golf easier, from the ability to share tee time invitations within the app with golf buddies, or potentially allowing pre-pay that eliminates the need to even go to the pro shop for a receipt to show to the starter at the first tee.

While the new Troon Access program is based primarily on the concept of frequency of play, Ma says the hope is that it’s an initial step in a deeper rewards program that offers unique opportunities to its most loyal customers.

“We’re playing around the idea of allowing them to play with different team Troon members or different celebrities. We’re also trying to get access to some of our private and semi-private courses that would be impossible for them to get on otherwise,” Ma said.

“And we also really want to stress the concept of community. One of my good friends moved up to Scottsdale. He’s like a plus-2 handicap, but can’t join a club out there, and really wants to find a community of great golfers to play with,” he added. “That’s kind of the vision of what we want Troon Access to be, just a great community of golfers that are really interested in playing Troon courses. And so, many of the things that we’re starting with now, we’ll be adding a lot more over time.”