Previous works on software reusability has shown that an asset-based systems development strategy to software reuse is effective in identifying reusable design components. This strategy requires moving away from traditional and stand-alone applications development toward an integrated approach. This paper will review previous work on using frames for knowledge representation and will show how an implementation strategy based on the frame-based representation can be useful as a possible implementation approach for the asset-based systems development strategy. q 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.