The word "柯达" is formed through a process of phonetic transliteration to represent the English brand name "Kodak". The Chinese characters were chosen not for their individual meanings, but primarily for how closely their combined pronunciation approximates the original English sound, "kē dá" mimics "Ko-dak". The characters themselves, 柯 (often a surname or referring to a stalk) and 达 (to reach or attain), were likely selected from common characters with those sounds to create a cohesive and visually stable brand name in Chinese, resulting in a new lexical unit that is entirely associated with the company.