Pfizer (PFE) offered up some more details on its weight loss drug pipeline on Tuesday during a call with investors after it posted its third-quarter earnings report.
During the call, the pharma giant shared more information on its three weight loss drug candidates and where they stand on the development cycle.
Pfizer joins several other pharmaceutical companies working to introduce their own incretin weight loss meds, first popularized by Ozempic, in an effort to disrupt the weight loss duopoly currently held by Novo Nordisk (NVO) and Eli Lilly (LLY) .
Incretin drugs are a class of diabetes and obesity medications that mimic hormones that regulate blood sugar and suppresses appetite. Demand for these medications have turned Ozempic maker Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, the producer of Mounjaro and Zepbound, into the largest pharma companies in the world. Morgan Stanley (MS) analysts anticipate the global market for GLP-1s will reach $105 billion by 2030.
In addition to Pfizer, Viking Therapeutics (VKTX), Roche, and Amgen, are all now developing weight loss meds. Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly are also working on developing their own next-gen weight loss drugs.
Pfizer seems to be primarily focused on incretin pills. Weight loss medications that already on the market are administered as once-weekly injections. But a pill could help with current supply constraints and open the market to patients hesitant to taking injections.
Pfizer still expects to be the second pharma company to introduce a weight loss pill
Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla told analysts that the company still expects its leading weight loss drug candidate, danuglipron, to be the second incretin weight loss pill to to enter the market.
“If [danuglipron] moves fast, based on what we know right now, we should be the second oral into the market, provided that the first one will be successful and the other ones will not come before us,” Bourla said. “But so far, this is what the situation looks like. So, there is no doubt that if successful, we will have a decent market share of oral.”
Pfizer announced in July it was advancing the development of danuglipron, a pill that mimics the gut hormone GLP-1. This is the same hormone that is stimulated by drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy.
In December, the pharma giant said that a twice-daily version of the pill helped patients, in an early stage trial, lose an average of 8% to 13% of their weight. However, the company decided not to advance this formulation to a late stage trial due to a high rate of side effects.
The company instead tested modified versions of the drug and has selected one to move forward to clinical trials where various doses of the pill will be tested.
Bourla said that more details from these new trial will be shared in early 2025.
The company also shed some light on its other weight loss drug candidates
Bourla also said that company is testing at least two other weight loss pills in early stage clinical trials.
One is once-daily GLP-1 pill that is currently in a phase 1 trial. The other one, a pill that blocks the gut hormone GIP, is expected to advance into a phase 2 trial this year. Pfizer chief scientific officer Mikael Dolsten said on the call that this pill with a different weight loss mechanism could potentially offer “better tolerability and more efficacy.”
An experimental pill from Amgen (AMGN), MariTide, works partly by blocking GIP, while also stimulating GLP-1.
An early stage trial of MariTide found that users on the drug lost average of 14.5% of their weight in about 12 weeks.