Doustdar was tapped as CEO last summer in part to restore the company’s presence in the diabetes and obesity space, after ceding ground to competitor Eli Lilly. Lilly’s weight-loss drug Zepbound comes at higher doses and so tends to produce greater weight loss than Wegovy. Novo Nordisk needed a chief executive with resilience and flexibility to lead the comeback, and Doustdar says he adopted those skills moving to a country where he didn’t speak the language. “I learned from an early age to build a bit of resilience and to manage uncertainty,” he says.
The new GLP-1 pill for obesity, the rollout of which he’s overseeing, boasts several advantages. Studies the company conducted showed that people taking the pill every day lose about the same amount of weight as those getting weekly injections—about 16% to 17% of their body weight. And because pills are cheaper to produce, more people may be able to afford a Wegovy pill. In an agreement with the White House, Wegovy pills cost $149 for a month’s supply of the starting doses, and $299 for the two higher doses, for people paying out of pocket as well as those on federal insurance plans. People whose private insurance plans cover the drug may pay as little as $25 a month.
Later this year, Doustdar also plans to introduce a higher dose of Wegovy’s injectable form, which the company’s studies show leads to about 20% weight loss, comparable to Lilly’s Zepbound, to “close the gap with our competitor.” Both are also studying a different group of compounds called amylins that could expand the range of weight-loss drugs even further.
While Novo Nordisk was also studying semaglutide’s potential to slow the progression of Alzheimer’s disease, a highly anticipated study revealed little difference between people injecting the drug and those getting placebo. Doustdar says his team will continue to analyze the data, but has decided to stop any additional studies on Alzheimer’s. Still, he is confident that there may be other health benefits of semaglutide, which amounts to what he calls “secret sauce.”
Doustdar’s strategy to grow Novo Nordisk’s presence involves building a portfolio of diabetes and obesity treatments that can meet the needs of as many people as possible. “We’re talking about 2 billion people, and eventually someone has to produce all the doses for them,” he says. “We are sitting in the right spot right now, and still only touching a fraction of the people who are in need.”