Example sentences
tā他zài在dà大gōng公sī司shàng上bān班。
He works at a big company.
gōng公sī司zhōu周mò末xiū休xi息。
The company is off on weekends.
About this word
公 is "public, fair" and 司 is "to manage", so 公司 is literally "public management", the body that runs business on behalf of a group of people. It is an old word that became the standard term for the modern company. The same 司 shows up in 司机, a driver, literally the one who manages the machine. Chinese uses 公司 far more loosely than English uses "company": 去公司 often just means going to the office, and a shop with three employees may still put 公司 on its sign.
The story behind the character
公
公 is 八 (to divide, to turn away) above 厶 (private). Han Feizi put it in four words: 背厶為公. Turn your back on the private and you get public. Xu Shen agreed, glossing 公 as 平分也, to divide evenly. Fair shares. That is what the shape is arguing for, and the word has meant public ever since.
司
司 is 后 flipped around. 后 in the oldest writing is a ruler sitting with a mouth, issuing orders to the four directions. Turn that shape around and you get 司, and Xu Shen defined it as 臣司事於外者: the officer who handles affairs out in the world. Same figure, other direction. The 司 in 公司 is the one running the business.