Eli Lilly plans to begin promoting weight-loss drug Zepbound

Eli Lilly (LLY) plans to promote its blockbuster weight-loss drug Zepbound for the first time next month.

Despite the recognition of the branded drug GLP-1 by investors and the industry, “the awareness of Zepbound alone … is actually not very high,” CEO David Ricks said in an earnings call Wednesday morning.

The company missed Wall Street's expectations for sales and profits, including for the drug itself – it reported sales of $1.3 billion for the quarter compared to expectations of $1.7 billion.

The company's shares fell more than 13% in early trading on Wednesday.

The FDA first approved the drug in November 2023 and sales reached over $1 billion in the second quarter of this year. To date, Lilly's total sales since the drug's introduction, excluding advertising, are $3.2 billion.

“We launched this drug almost a year ago and did not advertise it. That's why I think it's time to introduce the brand so that people are aware of that when they talk to their doctor,” Ricks said.

The company had to wait until supply met demand, which the FDA found earlier this month. However, that decision is being reconsidered following opposition from pharmacies, which have since been making up for the shortage with unapproved copycats of Lilly's tirzepatide drugs, including the diabetes drug Mounjaro.

Lucas Montarce, Lilly's new CFO, said the company has much more confidence in future supply. He added that the total addressable market for Zepbound has only reached 5% penetration – so the company needs to do everything it can to increase patient awareness, including through its direct-to-consumer platform LillyDirect.

The decision also comes at a time when Lilly is increasingly taking market share away from competitor Novo Nordisk (NVO), which announced the end of its shortages on Wednesday.

“If we look at the last 90 days [and] 180 days of US prescription growth, both brands growing aggressively. “We have now overtaken Wegovy in the weight loss space,” Ricks said in an interview with Yahoo Finance on Wednesday.

When it comes to diabetes, “we’re not quite there yet [matching] Ozempic with Mounjaro, but every week we basically eat up [market] share,” he added.

In weekly prescription data ended Oct. 18, Eli Lilly's Mounjaro captured 33% of the market share, up 79% from a year ago, while Novo's Ozempic was at 47%, up 39% from a year ago corresponds to the previous year. . However, the numbers have shifted in Lilly's favor this year, according to data compiled by JPMorgan analysts.

In February, weekly data through February 16 showed Mounjaro had a 29% market share, while Ozempic reached 44%.

The story continues

Market share data for Zepbound and Wegovy is not available, but quarterly average prescription data shows that Wegovy's prescriptions increased 123% year-over-year in October, compared to Zepbound's 3,281% increase. The data also shows that since launch, Zepbound's prescriptions surpassed all three other drugs (Ozempic, Mounjaro and Wegovy) within the first 12 weeks, but supply shortages slowed development.

Update: An earlier version of this article stated that Novo Nordisk is still experiencing shortages. The FDA declared an end to the Novo shortage today.

Anjalee Khemlani is the senior healthcare reporter at Yahoo Finance, covering all things pharma, insurance, care services, digital health, PBMs, and healthcare politics and policy. Of course, this also includes GLP-1. Follow Anjalee on most social media platforms @AnjKhem.

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