Perhaps you lack Jim Clark's knack for coming up with profitable new ideas. Not to worry-your company may have plenty of old ones lying around. According to the authors of Rembrandts in the Attic, it pays to root around in your company's patent portfolio and dust off drawings and formulas you thought you'd never look at again.

David Kline is a former war correspondent who now consults on business strategy. Kevin Rivette is co-founder and chair of Aurigin Systems, a company seeking to develop "intellectual property (IP) management solutions." The two are attempting to convince CEOs to manage their firms' IP just as carefully as they manage operations and finance. Surprisingly, it seems that many companies underestimate the worth of their own patent portfolios. And in an era when successful companies are set apart more by their ideas than by their resources or equipment, that can be a costly oversight.