ISO/IEC 21000-16:2005 specifies the binary format to efficiently serialize XML-based descriptions as specified within other ISO/IEC 21000 parts. The MPEG-21 binary format enables the efficient interchange or storage of ISO/IEC 21000 descriptions.

ISO/IEC 21000 (MPEG-21) defines an open framework for multimedia delivery and consumption, with both the content creator and content consumer as focal points. The vision for MPEG-21 is to define a multimedia framework to enable transparent and augmented use of multimedia resources across a wide range of networks and devices used by different communities.