11.

COMMITMENTS AND CERTAIN CONTINGENCIES

Lease Commitments

We have operating leases primarily for facilities, land, data centers and vehicles. As of May 31, 2019, future minimum annual operating lease payments and future minimum payments to be received from non-cancelable subleases were as follows:

 

(in millions)

 

 

 

 

Fiscal 2020

 

$

658

 

Fiscal 2021

 

 

538

 

Fiscal 2022

 

 

425

 

Fiscal 2023

 

 

262

 

Fiscal 2024

 

 

165

 

Thereafter

 

 

333

 

Future minimum operating lease payments

 

 

2,381

 

Less: minimum payments to be received from non-cancelable subleases

 

 

(33

)

Total future minimum operating lease payments, net

 

$

2,348

 

 

Lease commitments included future minimum rent payments for facilities that we have vacated pursuant to our restructuring and merger integration activities, as discussed in Note 8. We have approximately $58 million in facility obligations, net of estimated sublease income and other costs, in accrued restructuring for these locations in our consolidated balance sheet at May 31, 2019.

Rent expense was $665 million, $618 million and $501 million for fiscal 2019, 2018 and 2017, respectively, net of sublease income of approximately $16 million, $20 million and $24 million for fiscal 2019, 2018 and 2017, respectively. Certain lease agreements contain renewal options providing for extensions of the lease terms.

Unconditional Obligations

In the ordinary course of business, we enter into certain unconditional purchase obligations with our suppliers, which are agreements that are enforceable and legally binding and specify terms, including: fixed or minimum quantities to be purchased; fixed, minimum or variable price provisions; and the approximate timing of the payment. We utilize several external manufacturers to manufacture sub-assemblies for our hardware products and to perform final assembly and testing of finished hardware products. We also obtain individual components for our hardware products from a variety of individual suppliers based on projected demand information. Such purchase commitments are based on our forecasted component and manufacturing requirements and typically provide for fulfillment within agreed upon lead-times and/or commercially standard lead-times for the particular part or product and have been included in the amounts below. Routine arrangements for other materials and goods that are not related to our external manufacturers and certain other suppliers and that are entered into in the ordinary course of business are not included in the amounts below, as they are generally entered into in order to secure pricing or other negotiated terms and are difficult to quantify in a meaningful way.

As of May 31, 2019, our unconditional purchase and certain other obligations were as follows (in millions):

 

Fiscal 2020

 

$

661

 

Fiscal 2021

 

 

57

 

Fiscal 2022

 

 

22

 

Fiscal 2023

 

 

23

 

Fiscal 2024

 

 

23

 

Thereafter

 

 

259

 

Total

 

$

1,045

 

 

As described in Notes 7 and 10 above, as of May 31, 2019 we have senior notes and other borrowings of $56.3 billion that mature at various future dates and derivative financial instruments outstanding that we leverage to manage certain risks and exposures.

Guarantees

Our cloud, license and hardware sales agreements generally include certain provisions for indemnifying customers against liabilities if our products infringe a third party’s intellectual property rights. To date, we have not incurred any material costs as a result of such indemnifications and have not accrued any material liabilities related to such obligations in our consolidated financial statements. Certain of our sales agreements also include provisions indemnifying customers against liabilities in the event we breach confidentiality or service level requirements. It is not possible to determine the maximum potential amount under these indemnification agreements due to our limited and infrequent history of prior indemnification claims and the unique facts and circumstances involved in each particular agreement.

Our Oracle Cloud Services agreements generally include a warranty that the cloud services will be performed in all material respects as defined in the agreement during the service period. Our license and hardware agreements also generally include a warranty that our products will substantially operate as described in the applicable program documentation for a period of one year after delivery. We also warrant that services we perform will be provided in a manner consistent with industry standards for a period of 90 days from performance of the services.

We occasionally are required, for various reasons, to enter into financial guarantees with third parties in the ordinary course of our business including, among others, guarantees related to taxes, import licenses and letters of credit on behalf of parties with whom we conduct business. Such agreements have not had a material effect on our results of operations, financial position or cash flows.    

In connection with certain litigation, we posted certain court-mandated surety bonds with a court and entered into related indemnification agreements with each of the surety bond issuing companies. Additional information is provided in Note 17 below.

Historical Timeline

Fiscal YearFiled
2019Jun 21, 2019Showing above
2018Jun 22, 2018
2017Jun 27, 2017
2016Jun 22, 2016

About Commitments Disclosures

Commitments and contingencies disclosures catalog a company's off-balance-sheet obligations and legal exposures — purchase commitments, guarantee arrangements, pending litigation, and regulatory proceedings. These items represent potential future cash outflows that may not appear as liabilities on the balance sheet until they become probable and estimable.

Key signals: litigation reserves and disclosed loss ranges quantify management's estimate of legal exposure, but unquantified "reasonably possible" losses often represent the larger risk. Watch for changes in language around pending cases — shifts from "remote" to "reasonably possible" or increases in estimated loss ranges signal deteriorating outcomes. Unconditional purchase obligations and take-or-pay contracts create fixed cost structures that reduce operational flexibility. Guarantee arrangements for subsidiaries or joint ventures can create cascading obligations. Compare the total commitment schedule against projected free cash flow to assess whether the company can meet its obligations without additional financing.