Both have received investment from global Internet giant Google Inc.
Zhang Zhidong, co-founder of Tencent, said in March when he resigned from his position as chieftechnology officer, that he considered Google one of the world's pioneering forces in theinformation technology industry.
Google has already invested heavily in unmanned cars, hot-air balloons, and even space mining,some of which was spent when the company was nothing like the size it is today.
Zhang suggested that Tencent should follow Google in this respect, a path not necessarily in linewith what many see as the company's more sensible investment route.
Pony Ma, Tencent's chairman, once said that his childhood dream had been to become anastronomer, after looking through a friend's telescope at outer space.
"Although we are running a commercial enterprise, we are also pursuing technological progressand realizing something which used to only exist in the imagination. This is a dream," said Ma.
Poynter's comments in Beijing come just days after a suborbital passenger spaceshipdeveloped by Virgin Galactic crashed during a test flight over the company's Mojave Air andSpace Port in California, killing one pilot and seriously injuring another.
More than 800 people have already paid deposits to fly aboard the spaceship, which will betransported to an altitude of about 13,700 meters before being released.
