Ozempic maker Novo mulls taking on hair loss

Company seeks to expand its direct-to-consumer pharmaceuticals business

Novo CEO Mike Doustdar. Novo Nordisk is eyeing the hair-loss market as the maker of Ozempic seeks to expand its direct-to-consumer pharmaceuticals business. Picture: Bloomberg

Novo Nordisk is eyeing the hair-loss market as the maker of Ozempic seeks to expand its direct-to-consumer pharmaceuticals business.

The condition is part of a list of areas, including addiction and menopause, where Novo sees potential overlap with either its scientific expertise or with the skill it has recently built in selling prescription drugs directly to consumers.

Some of the science being pursued now for treatment of hair loss is rooted in endocrinology, the branch of medicine focused on hormones, a field where Novo has a long history, chief scientific officer Martin Lange said in a Bloomberg roundtable on Tuesday.

“We could leverage our scientific knowledge potentially moving into that space,” Lange said. “It’s not necessarily what we’ll pursue first, but that would be a clear possibility.”

Novo lost its lead in the booming obesity market to Eli Lilly and wants to find more uses for its GLP-1 drugs as well as growth areas where it can diversify as blockbusters Ozempic and Wegovy face patent expiry in the US and Europe toward the beginning of the next decade.

The company’s shares slumped this week in response to a lack of concrete details in the turnaround plan presented at an investor meeting. The stock fell as much as 1.8% on Tuesday in Copenhagen but recovered around midday.

“Confidence is gone, as shown yesterday by the reaction, and it takes time and hard work to build that back,” chief executive Mike Doustdar said in the roundtable. The drugmaker wants to pursue areas where its expertise in selling directly to consumers — as it increasingly does with weight-loss drugs — can give it an opportunity “to win,” Doustdar said.

“We need to start somewhere and then we need to search everywhere,” he said.

Rival Eli Lilly is also looking to expand in fields that could complement obesity, such as women’s health.

Pattern hair loss affects about 80m people just in the US, according to VeraDermics, one of the companies seeking to develop new treatments. That includes about 50m men, as well as about 30m women who currently don’t have any approved oral treatment options.

Because some of the consumer-facing projects Novo is considering can have shorter development timelines, they could reach the market around the turn of the decade, according to Lange. Novo could also strike deals, including for compounds that are closer to market, he said.

Hair loss isn’t on a list of eight illnesses where Lange anticipates to move new treatments into mid-stage trials by late this year or early next year.

The company is also seeking new potential treatments for heart disease, liver, and blood disorders and has said it will look at both bolt-on deals and push forward its internal drug pipeline more quickly. Projects in cardiology would have longer timelines, Lange said.

Bloomberg