Novo Nordisk has had a difficult year, faced with intense competition in the obesity space; however, the company’s Wegovy pill is offering a route to greener financial pastures.
In its Q1 results, Novo touted a strong early showing for the oral glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RA), which hit US markets in January 2026. For the week ending 17 April, total weekly prescriptions exceeded 200,000 for the drug. Total prescriptions for Q1 2026 hit 1.3 million, with that figure rising to more than two million since launch. Those numbers translate to DKr2.3bn ($360m) in quarterly revenue for oral Wegovy, further cementing the medicine’s robust early-market performance.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Discover B2B Marketing That Performs
Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms.
In an earnings call, Novo’s CEO Mike Doustdar said: “It is no secret that the Wegovy pill is off to a record-breaking start in the US.”
Later commenting on the interaction between volume uptake and the price point for the medicine, Doustdar added that the company is “at the sweet spot”.
The pill’s starting dose of 1.5mg is set at $149 per month for cash-paying patients. The second dose comes in at $199 per month, while the highest doses are charged at $299 monthly for non-insured patients.
“We are seeing a situation where at the current prices, we have had two million scripts after 16 weeks, [and] more than 200,000 scripts per week, despite [a] competitor having come now more than a month into the game […] at this point, I would say we have priced this product perfectly correct,” Doustdar added.
Eli Lilly – the unnamed competitor – entered the US market with the launch of its GLP-1RA pill Foundayo (orforglipron) in April 2026. In its third week on the market, which ended 24 April, Foundayo was prescribed around 5,600 times.
Pending regulatory decisions, Novo stated that the first Wegovy pill launches outside the US are expected during the second half of 2026. This territory expansion, combined with the continued high anticipated demand for its GLP-1RA portfolio, led Novo to raise its 2026 outlook. The Danish drugmaker now expects adjusted sales growth to shrink between 4% and 12% on a currency-adjusted basis, an improvement on the previously projected decline of between 5% and 13%.
Novo’s Q1 results outline a strong start to reaching that goal. The company’s net sales rose 32% at constant currency to reach DKr96.8bn ($15.2bn), while operating profit surged 65%.
Doustdar concluded: “I am very satisfied with our announcement today. 2026 is off to an exciting start, but we have much work left to do. Expect continued hard work from all of us in all fronts. This year, we are looking forward to, first and foremost, continuing to drive uptake with new products while providing access to many more patients worldwide.”
Lilly also raised its sales expectations for 2026 as it reported a 56% year-over-year surge in Q1 revenue. The company’s quarterly result was $2.4bn ahead of Visible Alpha consensus, cementing its leading position in the cardiometabolic market.
