From "Forbes" and "Fortune" to the "Wall Street Journal" and "Harvard Business Review", the pundits are calling it the next corporate strategy challenge: how to use patents and other intellectual property not just as legal tools but as weapons of business competition. With "Rembrandts in the Attic", authors Kevin Rivette and David Kline provide the first practical and strategic guide that shows CEOs and other managers how to unlock the enormous financial and competitive power hidden in their patent portfolios. Writing engagingly and citing numerous case studies, the authors warn that firms can no longer ignore the growing power of patents in business competition. The competitive battles once fought for control of markets and raw materials are today increasingly being waged over the exclusive rights to new ideas and innovations. Where once executives may have feared that their competitors might out-market or out-produce them, they must now be concerned that rivals - especially in the booming e-commerce sectors of the Internet - may secure exclusive patent rights to the essential technologies or even to the fundamental business concepts that they need to be in business in the first place. "Rembrandts in the Attic" lifts the veil of secrecy surrounding the use of patents in business competition today, showing how some of the world's most successful firms - market leaders such as Intel and Microsoft, Lucent and Gillette, IBM, and Priceline.com - have used patents to capture and defend markets, outflank rivals, boost bottom-line revenues and shareholder return, and enhance the commercial success of their enterprises. "Rembrandts in the Attic" is a superb strategy guide that demonstrates the cross-functional value companies can gain by using patents and the gold mine of competitive intelligence that they contain. The book will enable readers to map out technology trends and convergences, uncover the strategies and capabilities of friends and foes alike, and strengthen the competitive efforts of every functional unit in the enterprise, from R&D and marketing to finance, human resources, and mergers and acquisitions. CEOs will learn how to use the authors' patent-enhanced 'Grow-Fix-Sell triage' to help them better allocate corporate resources and build a higher growth portfolio of businesses. R&D managers can employ the authors' 'IP-3' strategy to help build category-leading products, amplify the branding and marketing efforts devoted to them, and secure the key 'choke points' that sustain their product or service advantage. And business development executives will discover how to use patents as competitive intelligence tools to uncover the most attractive M&A opportunities, strengthen valuation and due diligence efforts, and configure asset sales and transfers to greatest advantage. If patents are the 'smart bombs' of tomorrow's business wars, then "Rembrandts in the Attic" is the definitive guide to deploying them for profit and competitive advantage.
Kevin G. Rivette is the Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Aurigin, a consulting firm specializing in intellectual property issues. David Kline is a writer for The New York Times, Wired, Upside, and other major media and a commentator for National Public Radio's "Marketplace" business program.
