Obesity: The Next Questions
Before the incretin drug class proved its potential to prompt dramatic weight loss, the notion that obesity could be treated with a pill or injection was almost science fiction. Decades of research had yielded approaches with meagre efficacy or unacceptable safety, banishing the few medicines that made it to market to commercial obscurity.
Solid proof that pharmacological intervention can help shift excess body weight now exists. Three incretin agents have won obesity approvals and are selling strongly, leveraging the mechanisms of the metabolic hormones that they mimic. Novo Nordisk’s GLP-1 agonists Saxenda (liraglutide) and Wegovy (semaglutide), and Eli Lilly’s Zepbound (tirzepatide), which agonises a second incretin target, GIP, as well as GLP-1. These drugs are also sold under different brand names in type 2 diabetes.
Developers and investors are no longer asking ‘can obesity be effectively treated pharmacologically?’. The burning question now is ‘how big could the market become?’. Evaluate Pharma’s consensus forecasts, constructed from sellside analysts’ models, has the obesity market hitting $66bn by 2030. Projections that go further out have that number going considerably higher.
Other unknowns include how long patients might stay on these drugs, an issue that those involved in pricing and reimbursement are very keen to explore.
Those hoping to follow Novo and Lilly on to the market are asking how much it
might cost to catch up. What level of investment will clinical programmes require? What might an acquisition cost? And what are the chances of success for follow-on agents, with similar or perhaps novel mechanisms?
This short report attempts to start answering these questions, using Evaluate Omnium data. Using machine learning to analyse millions of data points, Evaluate Omnium allows clients to gain powerful visibility into the commercial potential and development risks of pharmaceutical assets at all phases of development. For more in-depth information on Omnium’s models, please see the end of this report or speak to a member of the team.
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