NS1 (IBM)

IBM NS1 Connect is managed DNS built around intelligent traffic steering rather than record hosting alone. It routes users to the best endpoint based on real-time performance, availability and geography, running on a global anycast network with API-first automation, and is offered with a 100 percent service level agreement.

Treating DNS as a decision layer is the product's whole argument and it is a real distinction. Conventional DNS answers a fixed question with a fixed answer, so any intelligence about where a user should be sent has to live in a load balancer the user must first reach. Making the routing decision at resolution moves it before the connection is opened, which is the only point at which you can steer someone away from a region entirely.

Steering on real-time performance rather than on static geography is the harder version of the same idea. Geographic proximity is a poor proxy for network performance, because peering and congestion frequently mean a more distant endpoint answers faster.

API-first automation matters because traffic steering configurations are complex enough that maintaining them by hand guarantees drift between what is configured and what was intended. Expressing the steering policy as code is the only way to review it before it takes effect.