Man’s best friend lives forever at South Korean cloning firm

Priced at US$100,000 a head, the puppies frolicking around the fenced lawn in western Seoul don’t come cheap – but at least their owners know exactly what they are getting.

The lawn belongs to the Sooam Biotech Research Foundation, a world leader in pet cloning that has run a thriving commercial business over the past decade catering to dog owners who want to live with their pets forever ... quite literally.

With a client list including princes, celebrities and billionaires, the foundation offers owners protection against loss and grief with a cloning service that promises the perfect replacement for a beloved pet. Since 2006, the facility has cloned nearly 800 dogs, commissioned by owners or state agencies seeking to replicate their best sniffer and rescue dogs.

“These people have very a strong bond with their pets ... and cloning provides a psychological alternative to the traditional method of just letting the pet go and keeping their memory,” said Wang Jae-woong, a researcher and spokesman for Sooam.

“With cloning, you have a chance to bring back the pets,” he said in the facility’s “care room” where each cloned puppy is kept in a glass-fronted, temperature-controlled pen and monitored by researchers around the clock.