该 - How do you know when to use it? Nothing to do with 应该?

Question

In the sentence below, why do you need 该公司? Chinese is contextual, right? 公司 talked about previously is 苹果. Instead of 该公司, why not use 它? Or 这个公司? 也有一些分析师和投资者为苹果辩护，他们说，***该公司*** 完全清楚自己在做什么，设定的价格也符合 ***该公司*** 的策略。 But there were some analysts and investors who came to the company’s defense and said that Apple knew exactly what it was doing, and set the price accordingly. (NYT translation) http://cn.nytimes.com/technology/20130912/c12iphone/dual/ Here's another example: 路易斯安那州共和党众议员约翰·弗莱明(John Fleming)说，“奥巴马医改法案(Obamacare)是国会有史以来通过的最危险的立法案。”他还说，***该法案*** 是“自大萧条(Great Depression)以来”，美国所面临的“最根本的经济威胁，所以，我认为，多一点额外的赤字不算什么。” “Obamacare is the most dangerous piece of legislation ever passed in Congress,” said Representative John Fleming, Republican of Louisiana. “It is the most existential threat to our economy” that the country has seen “since the Great Depression, so I think a little bit of additional deficit is nothing,” he added. http://cn.nytimes.com/world/20130913/c13fiscal/dual/

Answer 1

The difference between 应该 and 该 is this. 应该 is used to mean "should/ought to/must". However, if something is previously mentioned in a discussion or paragraph, you will often see 该 which means "regarding what was previously said".

Example 1: 我应该到图书馆去学习。

Example 2: 他被老板逼迫走了，该他去找别的工作吧。

Answer 2

该 is simply used in a more formal way than 它 or 这个. In this case it means “the previously mentioned” or “the aforementioned”. 该公司 is often used in news articles, essays, and theses, which are more formal than spoken Chinese. 它 is too informal and ambiguous. 这个 also suffers from being too 口语.