By Jaimy Lee and Steve Goldstein
The Danish company developed the most lucrative new drug the world had ever seen. Then America's Eli Lilly outmaneuvered it and took control of the diet-drug market.
In August 2024, Novo Nordisk bused its employees to the sprawling Roskilde fairgrounds outside Copenhagen for its annual summer party. The Danish company had hosted the bash for many years, but in 2024 the event roughly doubled in size to an estimated 20,000 attendees, according to local press reports, reflecting the fresh hiring of thousands of employees. Singers performed on four stages, and the festivities went on past midnight.
At Novo Nordisk, it looked like the party would never end. Weeks earlier, in June 2024, the company's stock had soared to its all-time high, valuing the drugmaker at $658 billion, according to FactSet. This company from Denmark, a country with a population of about 6 million, had again become the biggest company in Europe by market capitalization.
Novo's success was fueled by one thing: semaglutide, a medication that mimics the naturally occurring hormone in the gut that signals to the brain it's not hungry, while regulating digestion and blood sugar. Novo branded the drug Ozempic for Type 2 diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration first approved Ozempic in 2017, giving Novo a nearly five-year head start on Eli Lilly, the American pharmaceutical giant racing to catch up.
