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Royalties And Licenses
9 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2021
Royalties And Licenses [Abstract]  
Royalties And Licenses
(8) ROYALTIES AND LICENSES
Our royalty expenses consist of payments to (1) content licensors, (2) independent software developers, and (3) co-publishing and distribution affiliates. License royalties consist of payments made to celebrities, professional sports organizations, movie studios and other organizations for our use of their trademarks, copyrights, personal publicity rights, content and/or other intellectual property. Royalty payments to independent software developers are payments for the development of intellectual property related to our games. Co-publishing and distribution royalties are payments made to third parties for the delivery of products.
During the three and nine months ended December 31, 2021 and 2020, we did not recognize any material losses or impairment charges on royalty-based commitments.
The current and long-term portions of prepaid royalties and minimum guaranteed royalty-related assets, included in other current assets and other assets, consisted of (in millions):
As of
December 31, 2021
As of
March 31, 2021
Other current assets$26 $24 
Other assets22 20 
Royalty-related assets$48 $44 
At any given time, depending on the timing of our payments to our co-publishing and/or distribution affiliates, content licensors, and/or independent software developers, we classify any recognized unpaid royalty amounts due to these parties as accrued liabilities. The current and long-term portions of accrued royalties, included in accrued and other current liabilities and other liabilities, consisted of (in millions):
As of
December 31, 2021
As of
March 31, 2021
Accrued royalties$232 $210 
Other liabilities— 
Royalty-related liabilities$233 $210 
As of December 31, 2021, we were committed to pay approximately $2,064 million to content licensors, independent software developers, and co-publishing and/or distribution affiliates, but performance remained with the counterparty (i.e., delivery of the product or content or other factors) and such commitments were therefore not recorded in our Condensed Consolidated Financial Statements. See Note 12 for further information on our developer and licensor commitments.