Appointed in August 2025, new CEO and president Maziar Mike Doustdar announced a downsizing program involving 9,000 positions, equivalent to 11.5% of the whole workforce and $1.25bn in savings ($42.1bn revenue in 2024). This results from a decrease in revenues and profits, deriving from competitive pressure.
Novo Nordisk, long known for insulin, gained a first-mover advantage with the GLP-1 drug semaglutide (Ozempic in 2018, Wegovy in 2021), but demand for obesity treatments far exceeded expectations, triggering shortages, counterfeit issues and limits on supply. These shortages allowed US compounding pharmacies to sell their own versions, and many continue to do so even after shortages ended. Eli Lilly’s later entrant, tirzepatide (Mounjaro/ Zepbound), benefited from a “second-mover advantage,” resolving shortages faster and now leading new US prescriptions.
Novo is losing market share and now has more supply than demand, with the key constraint shifting to insurers’ willingness to pay for still-expensive obesity drugs, increasing pressure on prices as US negotiations approach in 2027 and patents begin expiring from 2028. Despite this, the performance gap with rivals may be smaller in real-world use, both companies have strong next-generation pipelines, and medical consensus has firmly shifted toward pharmacological treatment of obesity. The remaining challenge is making healthcare systems pay for it.
Sources
https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/novo-nordisks-new-chief-cuts-9000-jobs/4022196.article
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/NVO/novo-nordisk/revenue
