Yesterday, domestic company Tencent announced the establishment of its Internet research institute, the first of its kind set up by an internet company. The chief architect of Tencent, Zheng Quanzhan, was appointed as the head of the institute.

Tencent explained that as the R&D (research and development) platform for their core technologies, the primary objective of the Tencent Research Institute is to develop practical basic Internet technologies over the next 2-5 years and to promote the innovation of the next generation of the Internet. Meanwhile, the Institute will work closely with other first class scientific research institutions across the country to cultivate and reserve leading technological talents for Chinese Internet endeavors.

The Institute established branches in Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen. Its research will be mainly focused on the following six research areas: storage technologies, data mining, multimedia, Chinese processing, Internet distribution and wireless Internet.

The establishment of the research institute is an example of the measures adopted by many international high-tech enterprises to guarantee their technological innovations. Currently, international Internet companies like Microsoft, Google, and domestic leading IT companies like Lenovo also established their own research institutes. Tencent Research Institute is the first research institute set up by an entirely Chinese-owned corporation.

For more details, please read the full story in Chinese (http://www.bbtnews.com.cn/mainland/channel/30045.shtml).

(China.org.cn October 16, 2007)