Eli Lilly Begins $6.5 Billion Houston Plant for Oral GLP-1 Foundayo

Viking Therapeutics reported that patients on its VK2735 obesity drug preserved as much as 97% of prior weight loss with biweekly injections and up to 90% with monthly dosing, compared with 61% for those switched to placebo. The randomized Phase 1 study followed roughly 180 adults after an initial weekly-treatment phase. Eli Lilly shares rose 0.8% to $1,174.37 Tuesday as investors weighed the competitive readout. Lilly's second-quarter revenue surged 48% to $23 billion, powered mainly by rising Mounjaro and Zepbound volumes, and its $1,174.37 share price sits 24.35% below its $1,550 GF Value estimate. Viking's less-frequent schedule is intriguing, but pivotal trials, regulatory clearance, manufacturing scale and payer access still separate promising data from a genuine threat.

Novo Nordisk is exploring the hair-loss market as the Ozempic and Wegovy maker looks to diversify beyond its blockbuster GLP-1 drugs. Chief Scientific Officer Martin Lange said Novo could leverage its scientific expertise to move into hair loss, though the company has not decided whether to pursue the market first. The comments came as Novo outlined plans to find new growth areas beyond its weight-loss franchise, targeting more than five drugs with multi-blockbuster potential by 2030 and expecting more than $23 billion in risk-adjusted pipeline sales by 2035. The company also plans to pursue bolt-on deals and accelerate development of treatments for heart, liver and blood disorders, as Eli Lilly has taken share in the injectable GLP-1 market and Novo faces a longer-term patent cliff for semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy. Pattern hair loss affects an estimated 50 million men and 30 million women in the U.S., and no new FDA-approved therapy for the condition has emerged since the 1990s, according to the report.

Roche reported encouraging top-line results from a mid-stage study of enicepatide, its investigational once-weekly dual GLP-1/GIP receptor agonist, in adults with type 2 diabetes and overweight or obesity. In the 447-patient phase II CT-388-104 study, enicepatide met both primary endpoints at 48 weeks, delivering dose-dependent reductions in HbA1c and body weight. At the highest titrated dose of 24 mg, enicepatide reduced HbA1c by 2.65% from a baseline of 8.1%, with about 90% of patients achieving an HbA1c of 6.5% or lower and 62% reaching normoglycemia below 5.7%, while mean body-weight loss was 15.5% at 48 weeks with no evidence of a plateau. In patients with poor baseline glycemic control above 8.5%, the 24 mg dose led to an HbA1c reduction of 4.13% at 48 weeks, and the drug was generally well tolerated with discontinuations due to adverse events of 2.0% in the enicepatide groups versus 0% for placebo. Roche is advancing two ongoing phase III studies in chronic weight management, ENITH-1 and ENITH-2, and plans to initiate a phase III glycemic-control program and cardiovascular outcomes trials in the first half of 2027. Separately, Roche announced that the European Commission has approved Susvimo, a ranibizumab 100 mg/mL solution for injection, for the treatment of neovascular age-related macular degeneration, making it the first and only continuous-delivery treatment approved for nAMD in Europe.