Judgment_paragraph 30 · Agenzia delle Dogane and Ufficio di Verona dell’Agenzia delle Dogane v ADL American Dataline Srl (C-546/13)

30In those circumstances, the Corte suprema di cassazione (Court of Cassation) decided to stay the proceedings and to refer the following questions to the Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling:(1) Is it contrary to Articles 10(2) and 12 of … Regulation … No 2658/87 … and to the principle of legal certainty to interpret the amendments made to the Explanatory Notes accompanying Chapter 84 of the Schedule of Customs duties set out in Part II of Annex I thereto by … Regulation … [No 1549/2006] … (which excludes loudspeakers from heading 8471 [of the CN] where they are presented separately from automatic data-processing machines) in order to find that the goods imported by ADL … perform a specific function (reproduction and amplification of sound) “other” than data processing?(2) Must the goods imported by ADL …, namely “loudspeakers” marketed separately from automatic data-processing machines, be regarded as devices “performing a specific function other than data processing” — assuming that the reproduction and amplification of sound is indeed an example of that type of function — or is it not possible to regard them as system units performing a specific function other than data processing, since, having regard to their specific technical characteristics (connection only via USB cable; operating system MAC OS 9 required), they “have no function which they would be capable of performing without the assistance of such a machine [that is to say, without the assistance of an automatic data-processing machine]” (see [Peacock, C‑339/98, EU:C:2000:573], paragraphs 14 and 15, and [Olicom, C‑142/06, EU:C:2007:449], paragraphs 20, 29 and 30, which, although referring to other types of device — network cards and “combination” cards — seem to indicate that a lack of any “other” specific function stems from the fact that (i) the device cannot function without a personal computer and (ii) the device has the capacity to accept and to convert at output signals transmitted by the processor)?’