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In those circumstances the Hoge Raad der Nederlanden (Supreme Court of the Netherlands) decided to stay the proceedings and to refer the following questions to the Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling: ‘(1) Must Article 5(1) of Directive [2001/23] be interpreted as meaning that the condition that “bankruptcy proceedings or any analogous insolvency proceedings … have been instituted with a view to the liquidation of the assets of the transferor” has been met, where: (i) the insolvency of the transferor is inevitable and the transferor is therefore effectively insolvent, (ii) under Dutch law, the objective of the insolvency proceedings is to secure the highest possible return for the joint creditors by liquidating the debtor’s assets, and (iii) in a so-called pre-pack prior to the declaration of insolvency, preparations are made for the transfer of (part of) the undertaking but it is only carried out after the declaration of insolvency, given that (iv) prior to the declaration of insolvency, the “prospective insolvency administrator” appointed by the Rechtbank (District Court) must be guided by the interests of the joint creditors as well as by social interests such as the importance of job preservation, and the “prospective supervisory judge”, also appointed by the Rechtbank [(District Court)], must exercise a supervisory function in that regard, (v) the objective of the pre-pack is to enable, in the subsequent insolvency proceedings, a method of liquidation whereby (part of) the undertaking belonging to the assets of the transferor is sold as a going concern so as to obtain the highest possible return for the joint creditors and jobs are preserved as far as possible, and (vi) the structure of the procedure ensures that that objective is in fact the guiding principle? (2) Must Article 5(1) of the Directive be interpreted as meaning that the condition that “the bankruptcy proceedings or any analogous insolvency proceedings are under the supervision of a competent public authority” is fulfilled if the transfer of (part of) the undertaking is prepared in a pre-pack prior to the declaration of insolvency and is carried out after the declaration of insolvency, and (i) is monitored, prior to the declaration of insolvency, by a “prospective insolvency administrator” and a “prospective supervisory judge” who have been appointed by the Rechtbank [(District Court)] but who do not have legal powers, (ii) under Dutch law, prior to the declaration of insolvency, the “prospective insolvency administrator” is obliged to be guided by the interests of the joint creditors and by other social interests, such as the preservation of jobs, and the “prospective supervisory judge” is obliged to exercise a supervisory function in that regard, (iii) the duties of the “prospective insolvency administrator” and the “prospective supervisory judge” do not differ from those of the insolvency administrator and the supervisory judge in the insolvency proceedings, (iv) the agreement on the basis of which the company is transferred and which has been prepared during a pre-pack is only concluded and executed after the insolvency has been declared, (v) the Rechtbank [(District Court)], when declaring the insolvency, may proceed to appoint an insolvency administrator or a supervisory judge other than the “prospective insolvency administrator” or the “prospective supervisory judge”, and (vi) the same requirements of objectivity and independence apply to the insolvency administrator and the supervisory judge as apply to an insolvency administrator and a supervisory judge in insolvency proceedings that were not preceded by a pre-pack and, irrespective of the degree of their involvement prior to the declaration of insolvency, they are obliged by virtue of their statutory duty to assess whether the transfer of (part of) the undertaking prepared prior to the declaration of insolvency is in the interests of the joint creditors, and if they answer that question in the negative, to decide that such a transfer will not take place, while they are also always entitled to decide on other grounds, for example, because other social interests, such as the interest of employment, are opposed to it, that the transfer of (part of) the undertaking prepared prior to the declaration of insolvency will not take place?’