Internet Protocol Multimedia Communications (IPMC)

IP Multimedia Communications (IPMC) refers to communication protocols and systems that operate over an ▲IP network, including the ▲Internet, enabling voice (▲VoIP), video (▲VC), instant messaging (▲IM), whiteboarding, application sharing, and other forms of multimedia communication.

While VoIP narrowly focuses on the transport of traditional voice phone calls over an IP network and videoconferencing (a.k.a., ▲telepresence) focuses on communication using voice and video capabilities, IPMC is a more expansive term that covers all forms of person-to-person or person-to-machine communication capabilities as mentioned above.

IPMC has slowly evolved over the years, with first generation of IP-based multimedia communication systems like ▲H.323 and ▲SIP primarily focusing on voice. Somewhat prior and parallel to such VoIP systems, there were a number of popular systems that operated over IP networks to enable functionality like application sharing. Still, no one system actually enabled all forms of communication in a standard, interoperable way.

The convergence of all of these various packet-switched conversational protocols, as we call them, is referred to as IP Multimedia Communications. The ITU initiated work in 2007 to develop the world's first international standard to deliver the functionality of real IPMC in a project called ▲H.325, a project that was then formally launched in 2008. H.325 intends to not only deliver true multimedia communication capabilities, but will also enable a plurality of independent devices to communicate together in order to give the user the most natural and simple communication experience possible.