A multicast VPN is a collection of multicast-enabled VRF instances that are members of the same virtual private network. The MulticastVPN class is a subclass of the VPN class.

A multicast VPN is defined by two sets of sites, a sender site set and a receiver site set, with the following properties:

  • A sender site set includes PE devices with local VPN multicast sources: VPN customer multicast sources that are either directly connected to one another or are connected through a CE device. A PE in the sender site set is the sender PE.

  • A receiver site set includes PE devices that have local VPN multicast receivers: VPN customer multicast receivers that are either directly connected to one another or are connected through a CE device. A PE in the receiver site set is the receiver PE.

    A multicast VPN provides a multicast VPN service or both a multicast VPN service and a unicast VPN service.

    Appendix B, “Next Generation Multicast VPNs,” provides additional information about the multicast VPN implementation that is supported by MPLS Manager.