Tag along rights (TARs) comprise a group of clauses in a contract which together have the effect of allowing the minority shareholder(s) in a corporation to also take part in a sale of shares by the majority shareholder to a third party under the same terms and conditions. Consider an example: A and B are both shareholders in a company, with A being the majority shareholder and B the minority shareholder. C, a third party, offers to buy A's shares at an attractive price, and A accepts. In this situation, tag-along rights would allow B to also participate in the sale under the same terms and conditions as A. As with other contractual provisions, tag-along rights originated from the doctrine of freedom of contract and is governed by contract law (in common law countries) or the law of obligations (in civil law countries). As tag-along rights are contractual terms between private parties, they are often found in venture capital and private equity firms but not public companies. Structure Generally speaking, tag-along rights comprise three devices: the tag-along clause itself, and a method of enforcement, such as a put option and/or a penalty clause (only applicable in civil law countries as the common law does not uphold penalty clauses). The tag-along clause itself grants the minority shareholder the right (but not the obligation) to participate in the sale planned by the majority. The majority shareholder must notify all other minority shareholders covered under tag-along provisions and allow them to join in the transaction. If the majority shareholder ignores this obligation, the put option/right to sell provisions engage to enforce the tag-along clause. For instance, if A sells his/her shares to C without including B, the put option would entitle B the right to sell his/her holding to A. A now has a legal obligation to buy B’s shares if B so chooses to exercise his/her put option, which disincentivizes A’s original opportunistic behaviour. In essence, the gist of this mechanism is quite simply “Either you let me out or you stay in”. The possible inclusion of a penalty clause as a premium on top of the put option further disincentivizes opportunistic behaviour because A will now have to buy B’s shares in the company at a higher price than when he/she originally sold his/her stake to C, effectively meaning “Either you let me out or you stay in, with a penalty”.