Merck & Co. Inc. has turned to Asia for a second time to get into the GLP-1 market, this time to Shanghai-based Hansoh Pharmaceutical Group Co. Ltd. for its investigational preclinical oral small-molecule GLP-1 receptor agonist. Hansoh is getting $112 million up front and could bring in another $1.9 billion in milestone payments. Merck said the addition to its GLP-1 arsenal is “to provide additional cardiometabolic benefits beyond weight reduction.”
Although head-to-head results on tolerability were missing from the company’s data release, Eli Lilly and Co. said its U.S. FDA-approved weight-loss drug Zepbound (tirzepatide) beat the also-cleared Novo Nordic A/S compound Wegovy (semaglutide) in a phase IIIb study comparing the two.
Positive findings from a phase III trial of semaglutide in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) is moving Novo Nordisk A/S to expand the glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonist’s indications in the U.S. and Europe, the Danish pharma said, as the MASH field sights more novel therapies.
Nearly $3.8 billion was earned by Novo Nordisk A/S and Eli Lilly and Co. in the third quarter for their glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) drugs to treat obesity. Novo’s GLP-1 drug, Wegovy (semaglutide), approved by the U.S. FDA in June 2021, had sales of DKK17.3 billion (US$2.5 billion), while Lilly’s Zepbound (tirzepatide), which is a GLP-1 and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide dual agonist FDA-approved in November 2023, posted sales of $1.26 billion for the quarter.
Positive findings from a phase III trial of semaglutide in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) is moving Novo Nordisk A/S to expand the glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonist’s indications in the U.S. and Europe, the Danish pharma said, as the MASH field sights more novel therapies.
Semaglutide, the glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonist from Novo Nordisk A/S, which has seemingly improved every disease it’s been tested on, was a focus at Kidney Week 2024, where researchers presented data from multiple clinical studies in patients with kidney diseases.
A major increase in the popularity of weight loss drugs, particularly GLP-1s, has created a rivalry with traditional device orientated approaches, but a new technology aims to navigate the space between them.
Danish pharma giant Novo Nordisk A/S is set to launch its blockbuster glucagon-like peptide-1 therapy, Wegovy (semaglutide), in South Korea’s growing obesity therapeutics market next week, a company official confirmed to BioWorld.
South San Francisco-based Septerna Inc. filed an S-1 with the U.S. SEC to conduct an IPO on Nasdaq about two years and eight months after launching operations with a $100 million series A led by Third Rock Ventures. The company is focused on G protein-coupled receptor oral small molecules derived from its Native Complex Platform, aimed at treating diseases within the endocrinology, immunology and inflammation, and metabolic diseases realms.
