NOTE 14 — COMMITMENTS AND CONTINGENCIES

Capital Lease Commitments

We have capital leases for datacenters and corporate offices. As of September 30, 2016 and June 30, 2016, assets recorded under capital leases were $1.1 billion and $865 million, respectively, and accumulated depreciation associated with capital leases was $72 million and $57 million, respectively. For the three months ended September 30, 2016, property and equipment acquired under capital leases was $267 million. We did not acquire any property and equipment under capital leases for the three months ended September 30, 2015. As of September 30, 2016 and June 30, 2016, capital lease obligations included in other current liabilities were $32 million and $25 million, respectively, and capital lease obligations included in other long-term liabilities were $1.0 billion and $761 million, respectively.

 

Future minimum lease payments under non-cancellable capital leases as of September 30, 2016 are as follows:

 

(In millions)
Year Ending June 30,
2017 (excluding the three months ended September 30, 2016)		$	61
2018			83
2019			85
2020			87
2021			89
Thereafter			1,052
Total (a)		$	1,457

 

(a)	As of September 30, 2016, capital leases included imputed interest of $410 million.

As of September 30, 2016, we had additional purchase obligations for capital leases executed but not yet recorded of $5.0 billion.

Other Commitments

On June 11, 2016, we entered into a definitive agreement to acquire LinkedIn Corporation (“LinkedIn”) for $196 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at $26.2 billion, inclusive of LinkedIn’s net cash (the “Merger Agreement”). We will finance the transaction primarily through the issuance of new indebtedness. The Merger Agreement has been unanimously approved by the Boards of Directors of Microsoft and LinkedIn, and has been approved by LinkedIn’s shareholders. We expect the acquisition will close in calendar year 2016, subject to satisfaction of certain regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. The acquisition is expected to accelerate the growth of LinkedIn, as well as Office 365 and Dynamics.

Patent and Intellectual Property Claims

IPCom patent litigation

IPCom GmbH & Co. (“IPCom”) is a German company that holds a large portfolio of mobile technology-related patents spanning about 170 patent families and addressing a broad range of cellular technologies. IPCom has asserted 19 of these patents in litigation against Nokia Corporation (“Nokia”) and many of the leading cell phone companies and operators. In November 2014, Microsoft and IPCom entered into a standstill agreement staying all of the pending litigation against Microsoft to permit the parties to pursue settlement discussions.

InterDigital patent litigation

InterDigital Technology Corporation and InterDigital Communications Corporation (collectively, “IDT”) filed four patent infringement cases against Nokia in the International Trade Commission (“ITC”) and in U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware between 2007 and 2013. We have been added to these cases as a defendant. IDT has cases pending against other defendants based on the same patents because most of the patents at issue allegedly relate to 3G and 4G wireless communications standards essential functionality. The cases involving us include three ITC investigations where IDT sought an order excluding importation of 3G and 4G phones into the U.S. and one active case in U.S. District Court in Delaware seeking an injunction and damages. Each of the ITC matters has been resolved in our favor. In September 2015, in an inter partes review the United States Patent Trial and Appeal Board issued a final written decision that deemed unpatentable all asserted claims of the patent remaining at issue in the Delaware case. IDT appealed this decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The Delaware case has been stayed pending final completion of the inter partes review (including appeals and any subsequent proceedings in the Patent Office). We filed an antitrust complaint against IDT in the District of Delaware in August 2015 asserting violations of Section 2 of the Sherman Act, alleging unlawful exploitation of standard essential patents. That case is set for trial in September 2018.

 

European copyright levies

We assumed from Nokia all potential liability due to Nokia’s alleged failure to pay “private copyright levies” in various European countries based upon sale of memory cards and mobile phones that incorporate blank memory. The levies are based upon a 2001 European Union (“EU”) Directive establishing a right for end users to make copies of copyrighted works for personal or private use, but also allowing the collection of levies based upon sales of blank media or recording devices to compensate copyright holders for private copying. Various collecting societies in EU countries initiated litigation against Nokia, stating it must pay levies not only based upon sales of blank memory cards, but also phones that include blank memory for data storage on the phones, regardless of actual usage of that memory. The most significant cases against Nokia were pending in Germany and Austria, due to both the high volume of sales and high levy amounts sought in these countries. We reached a settlement of the Austrian case in August 2016. In Germany, the only period for which settlement has not been reached is 2004-2007. In July, the German Supreme Court heard our appeal contesting the legality of the levy assessed on phones with music players and over five megabytes of memory. The Supreme Court vacated the lower court’s ruling, and we are awaiting the Supreme Court’s full opinion. We expect that the case will be remanded for further proceedings to set an appropriate levy for the 2004-2007 period.

Other patent and intellectual property claims

In addition to these cases, there were 58 other patent infringement cases pending against Microsoft as of September 30, 2016.

Antitrust, Unfair Competition, and Overcharge Class Actions

Antitrust and unfair competition class action lawsuits were filed against us in British Columbia, Ontario, and Quebec, Canada. All three have been certified on behalf of Canadian indirect purchasers who acquired licenses for Microsoft operating system software and/or productivity application software between 1998 and 2010.

The trial of the British Columbia action commenced in May 2016. The plaintiffs filed their case in chief in August 2016, setting out claims made, authorities, and evidence in support of their claims. A six-month oral hearing is scheduled to commence in September 2017, consisting of cross examination on witness affidavits. The Ontario and Quebec cases are inactive.

Other Antitrust Litigation and Claims

China State Administration for Industry and Commerce investigation

In 2014, Microsoft was informed that China’s State Administration for Industry and Commerce (“SAIC”) had begun a formal investigation relating to China’s Anti-Monopoly Law, and the SAIC conducted onsite inspections of Microsoft offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Chengdu. SAIC has stated the investigation relates to compatibility, bundle sales, file verification issues related to Windows and Office software, and potentially other issues.

Product-Related Litigation

U.S. cell phone litigation

Nokia, along with other handset manufacturers and network operators, is a defendant in 19 lawsuits filed in the Superior Court for the District of Columbia by individual plaintiffs who allege that radio emissions from cellular handsets caused their brain tumors and other adverse health effects. We assumed responsibility for these claims as part of our acquisition of Nokia’s Devices and Services business and have been substituted for the Nokia defendants. Nine of these cases were filed in 2002 and are consolidated for certain pre-trial proceedings; the remaining 10 cases are stayed. In a separate 2009 decision, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia held that adverse health effect claims arising from the use of cellular handsets that operate within the U.S. Federal Communications Commission radio frequency emission guidelines (“FCC Guidelines”) are pre-empted by federal law. The plaintiffs allege that their handsets either operated outside the FCC Guidelines or were manufactured before the FCC Guidelines went into effect. The lawsuits also allege an industry-wide conspiracy to manipulate the science and testing around emission guidelines.

In 2013, defendants in the consolidated cases moved to exclude plaintiffs’ expert evidence of general causation on the basis of flawed scientific methodologies. In 2014, the court granted in part defendants’ motion to exclude plaintiffs’ general causation experts. The plaintiffs filed an interlocutory appeal challenging the standard for evaluating expert scientific evidence, which the District of Columbia Court of Appeals agreed to hear en banc. Trial court proceedings are stayed pending resolution of the appeal.

Canadian cell phone class action

Nokia, along with other handset manufacturers and network operators, is a defendant in a 2013 class action lawsuit filed in the Supreme Court of British Columbia by a purported class of Canadians who have used cellular phones for at least 1,600 hours, including a subclass of users with brain tumors. Microsoft was served with the complaint in June 2014 and has been substituted for the Nokia defendants. The litigation is not yet active as several defendants remain to be served.

Other Contingencies

We also are subject to a variety of other claims and suits that arise from time to time in the ordinary course of our business. Although management currently believes that resolving claims against us, individually or in aggregate, will not have a material adverse impact on our consolidated financial statements, these matters are subject to inherent uncertainties and management’s view of these matters may change in the future.

As of September 30, 2016, we accrued aggregate legal liabilities of $443 million in other current liabilities. While we intend to defend these matters vigorously, adverse outcomes that we estimate could reach approximately $1.6 billion in aggregate beyond recorded amounts are reasonably possible. Were unfavorable final outcomes to occur, there exists the possibility of a material adverse impact on our consolidated financial statements for the period in which the effects become reasonably estimable.