Ask any seasoned networking professional and he will tell you that while corporate DNS/DHCP services are mission-critical they tend to receive minimal attention.  This negligence is no longer tolerable -- businesses depend upon the network for access to data center resources, web-based applications, and IP phones; and, network availability depends upon DNS/DHCP.  Over the next few years, large and small organizations will finally give DNS/DHCP its due as:

• Companies give ownership of DNS/DHCP to networking groups.  A big reason for DNS/DHCP neglect in the past was that these services sat somewhere between UNIX and Windows administrators and the networking group.  ESG believes that companies will move the care and feeding of DNS/DHCP exclusively to networking as these services anchor network architecture, administration, and service levels. 
  
• Business needs demand an alternative to legacy BIND.  BIND is clearly the workhorse name server platform but the old nag has gotten a bit long in the tooth.  To meet dynamic business requirements, large organizations will implement a new generation of appliance-based DNS/DHCP systems offering superior availability, security, and reporting capabilities while providing for ease-of-use administration. 
  
• Users see DNS/DHCP appliances as a worthy alternative to Microsoft.  While Microsoft bundles DNS/DHCP in Windows Server software as an essential component of Active Directory, users describe major shortcomings in Windows DNS/DHCP’s ability to meet business and regulatory compliance needs.  As a result, many organizations are willing to pass on Microsoft’s “free” DNS and DHCP and invest in a robust appliance-based DNS/DHCP infrastructure as part of their AD rollout. 

To research this report, ESG interviewed numerous IT and network managers responsible for DNS/DHCP services.  These individuals came from various industry segments including federal government agencies, local/state government agencies, healthcare companies, and high-tech manufacturing companies.