Swiss drugmaker Roche is to speed up the launch of its anti-obesity drugs, following the ongoing success of rivals Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly in the weight loss market.
The company’s weight loss pills and injectables are now expected to hit the market by 2028. These drugs have been acquired by Roche following the takeover of the biotechnology company Carmot Therapeutics back in January.
The takeover gave Roche access to a Phase-2 ready subcutaneous injectable, which could potentially be a standalone treatment, also having the capacity to be used in combination with other weight-loss treatments. This injection is suitable for patients both with and without type 2 diabetes.
Roche now also has access to an oral pill currently in Phase-1, also suitable for patients both with and without diabetes, as well as another subcutaneous injectable for patients with type 1 diabetes. The pill is reported to have shown a 6.1% decrease in weight following four weeks.
The company has also reported that there are other weight management drugs under development, obtained from the Carmot acquisition as well.
Roche CEO Thomas Schinecker said, in the earnings statement for the first half of 2024: "Our strong sales growth in the first half of 2024 reflects the high demand for our innovative medicines and diagnostics. In the second quarter, we saw an acceleration of our growth momentum as group sales were no longer impacted by the decline in COVID-19 sales, resulting in very strong sales growth for the group. Based on our strong half-year results, we are raising our earnings outlook for the full year."
The company has also secured several regulatory approvals over the past three months, such as the EU Alecensa approval, for a kind of early-stage lung cancer. It has also received permission for the subcutaneous injection form of Ocrevus.
Why is Roche speeding up the drug launch?
According to Grand View Research, the worldwide weight management market was worth about $142.58bn in 2022 and is likely to grow 9.94% annually every year until 2030. As such, other drug makers such as Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk, who have already made their mark onto the market, with their drugs Wegovy and Mounjaro respectively, already have a significant advantage over Roche.
As such, by speeding up its weight-loss drug launch, Roche could secure itself a better chance of tapping into the market as well. The company's drugs are likely to have some advantages over these rivals, such as ease of scalability, due to being produced synthetically. Roche is also planning to restructure itself by focusing on a smaller, but more effective and profitable group of drugs, such as treatments for Alzheimer's and weight loss.
However, challenges do remain. Both Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk's drugs currently offer higher weight reduction percentages than Roche's treatments at 15% and 20% respectively, compared with Roche's 6.1%.
Roche has also had a string of research issues recently, which may need the company to streamline certain processes in order to see success with its weight-loss offerings.
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