Cisco launches Intercompany Media Engine

Cisco is promising higher quality video calls

Cisco has unveiled its Intercompany Media Engine (IME), claiming that the system will allow its unified communications (UC) tools to be used for external video communications between companies.

Joe Burton, chief technology officer for UC at Cisco, explained in a video briefing seen by V3.co.uk that the product will offer vastly improved communications.

"IME is the first product of its kind that allows the secure placing of calls between companies, to offer a rich voice and video experience using the existing phone numbers companies already call one another on," he said.

The offering represents another move by Cisco to push its UC technology, after announcing in January that it is creating an interoperability standard for video technologies to help drive the take up of systems like its TelePresence product.

Polycom, one of Cisco's key rivals in this space, has also announced new developments in recent months, including a commitment to the H.264 compression technology designed to cut bandwidth requirements in half.