Types of companies

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Public Limited Liability Company or PLC

(also Inc in US_en)

Publicly tradeable shares
The owners are _not_ liable for legal actions and debts the company may face
Managed by a CEO elected by a Board of Directors (Board) which in turn is elected by the share holders in scheduled meetings.
Extra share holder meetings can usually be called up if enough share holders deem it necessary for some reason
Usually listed in one or many w:Stock exchanges
Rules of stock exchanges define some minimums to capital, cash flow and market value for PLCs to be viable for trading

Limited Liability Company or LLC

(also LTD in UK_en and Inc in US-en)

Non-publicly tradeable shares
The owners are _not_ liable for legal actions and debts the company may face
Managed by a CEO elected by a Board of Directors (Board) which in turn is elected by the share holders in scheduled meetings.
Extra share holder meetings can usually be called up if enough share holders deem it necessary for some reason

Genral Partnership

Formed by two or more persons
The owners are all liable for legal actions and debts the company may face _personally_

Limited Partnership

Like a General Partnership exept for the fact that there is/are so called silent partners who just invest capital into the business and are not liable for legal actions and debts the company may face

Sole Trader

A sole trader is liable for legal actions and debts personally

I think these last ones are not so commonplace

Co-operative

There are two kinds of Co-operatives,

those owned collectively by the customers
those owned and managed collectively by the Workforce

==Limited Liability Partnership== (In UK at least, very new)

You'll have to see the UK law books about this one