25/12/2025

BIZ & FINANCE THURSDAY | DEC 25, 2025

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Lilly, Novo lock horns in India’s obesity drug race

HYDERABAD: Global pharma giants Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk are scrambling to cement their lead in India’s booming obesity drug market before cheaper generic versions hit shelves in March next year. Novo’s strategy emphasises price cuts and accelerated launches, while Lilly’s products benefitted from hitting the market early. Both firms focused on aggressive outreach to doctors, heavier advertising about obesity, tie-ups with clinics, patient incentives and distribution deals with local drugmakers, according to doctors, analysts, medical representatives, patients and distributors. Lilly has even teamed up in India with well-known Bollywood actors in a social media ad campaign about obesity. India, projected to have the world’s second-largest overweight or obese population by 2050 in absolute numbers, is becoming a key battleground for obesity drugs. Analysts expect the global market for such drugs to hit US$150 billion a year by the end of this decade. Although the US remains the largest market for obesity drugs, early sales figures in India show rapid uptake, even though most patients in the world’s most populous nation pay for the medication out-of-pocket. “We believe that this market can be more than US$1 billion within two years,” said Shrikant Akolkar, vice-president at research firm Nuvama Institutional Equities. Data analytics firm Pharmarack said in July that the market was estimated to be worth 6.28 billion rupees (RM284 million) at present, growing fivefold since 2021. US drugmaker Lilly’s Mounjaro, approved for diabetes and weight loss in India, became the top-selling therapy by value in October, with sales doubling within months of its

o Pharma giants partner with local firms to expand market reach

analyst at Systematix Institutional Equities. He added that Lilly faces no immediate pressure to cut prices, given its strong position. Even if Lilly lowers prices later, Mounjaro would still cost about 30% more than other branded weight-loss drugs, he said. Lilly declined to comment on its Indian pricing strategy. It said, however, that early response to Mounjaro in India has been “highly encouraging”. Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro belong to a class of drugs called GLP-1 agonists, which mimic a hormone that slows digestion and helps people feel full longer. Novo has sued Dr Reddy’s and Sun Pharma in a local court to enforce semaglutide patents and attempted to block generics until March 2026. Longer patent protection for Mounjaro’s active ingredient, tirzepatide, which extends at least until the middle of the next decade, also gives Lilly an advantage, analysts said. The battle has expanded beyond pricing and patents. Demand for weight-loss treatments in India is spreading beyond urban elites as interest grows among middle-class families, office workers, women nearing menopause and people with obesity-related complications in smaller towns.

fight – particularly for Novo – for dominance in India’s price-sensitive market. Shrotriya played down concerns over looming patent expiries, telling Reuters that Novo will focus on quality, trust and affordability rather than on patents or competition in India. Lilly’s Mounjaro has quickly gained traction in India. A 2.5 mg Mounjaro KwikPen costs about 13,125 rupeesfor a month’s usage, with the highest 15 mg dose going up to 25,781 rupees. In response, Novo cut the price of Wegovy in India by up to 37% in November, pricing its lowest dose of 0.25 mg at 10,850 rupees for a one-month pack. It launched Ozempic last week for a monthly price of 8,800 rupees for 0.25 mg. While Wegovy is catching up, Mounjaro’s early launch helped it penetrate the market, and the latter drug’s claim of offering greater weight loss makes it a popular choice among patients, said five doctors who spoke with Reuters. “Mounjaro clearly has first-strike advantage and continues to have strong demand, but price-sensitive patients are reassessing alternatives,” said Dr. Anoop Misra, an endocrinologist and executive chairman of Fortis C-DOC Hospital. Mounjaro also differentiates itself by targeting people with severe obesity, said Vishal Manchanda,

Lilly has partnered with India’s third-largest drugmaker by revenue, Cipla, to launch a second tirzepatide brand, Yurpeak, targeting smaller towns, and teamed up with Apollo Hospitals to raise awareness of obesity and diabetes. It is also investing more than US$1 billion to expand contract manufacturing in India. Cipla said it would help market Lilly’s weight-loss medication in deeper markets in India. Meanwhile, Novo has tied up with Emcure Pharmaceuticals and launched a second semaglutide brand, Poviztra, to widen distribution beyond India’s major cities. It has teamed with startup Healthify to offer patients health coaching and with Apollo to raise awareness of obesity. In India, where prescription drug ads are prohibited, Novo launched a “WeGoWithYou” obesity awareness campaign that connects people to doctors to learn more about the disease and its management. Lilly has a similar initiative known as “WeKnowNow” that talks about obesity management. Both drugmakers are pushing to frame obesity as a disease, utilising newspaper ads, billboards, airport displays and pamphlets at wellness clinics. Neither company disclosed its spending on marketing in India. – Reuters

March launch, outpacing Danish drugmaker Novo’s Wegovy, which entered the Indian market in June. “We realised just after a couple of months that for accessibility, we had to take a price cut,” said Vikrant Shrotriya, Novo Nordisk’s managing director in India, referring to Wegovy’s price cut in November. Shrotriya spoke earlier this month while launching Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster diabetes drug, Ozempic, in the country. Ozempic, a once-weekly injection approved by the US drug regulator in 2017 for Type 2 diabetes, became a global bestseller and is widely used off-label for weight loss due to its appetite-suppressing effects. More than 20 Indian drugmakers, including Dr Reddy’s , Cipla, Sun Pharma, Zydus and Lupin, plan to launch cheaper versions of Novo’s weight-loss drug in India once its patent on semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy and Ozempic, expires in March 2026. Analysts expect generic drugs to cost about 60% less, intensifying the

Pakistani firm wins auction for state airline PIA ISLAMABAD: A Pakistani firm won an auction on Tuesday with a US$482 million bid for a majority stake in the embattled national carrier PIA, a deal seen as a litmus test of the government’s pledge to sell off loss-making state companies.

US slams China policies on chips but will delay tariffs WASHINGTON: US trade officials determined that China should be punished for employing unfair tactics to dominate the semiconductor industry, but will wait 18 months to impose tariffs, American authorities said on Tuesday. A US Trade Representative investigation concluded China’s targeting of semiconductors “for dominance is unreasonable and burdens or restricts US commerce and thus is actionable”, the agency said in a public notice. The current tariff level of 0 will be increased “in 18 months on June 23, 2027 to rate to be announced not fewer than 30 days prior to that date”, USTR said. USTR officials launched the probe in December 2024 in the final weeks of Joe Biden’s presidency, extending the initiative when Donald Trump took office in January. Trump has been a prolific purveyor of tariffs, unveiling sector-specific levies on steel, autos and other items, as well as broader measures to achieve a variety of policy objectives. The White House has jousted with Beijing, but reached a broad truce with China after a major escalation in the spring. The USTR’s “Section 301” probe concluded that China had employed “increasingly aggressive and sweeping non-market policies” to dominate semiconductors that have included “massive and persistent” state support of private actors and “wage-suppressing labor practices”. The USTR did not respond to an AFP query on the reason for the 18-month timeframe on tariffs. – AFP

Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), long accused by critics of being bloated and poorly run, has been burning through cash as the government struggles with a balance of payments crisis. Three Pakistani firms competed in the auction carried live by state broadcasters, with representatives placing their offers in a clear box during several rounds of bidding. The Arif Habib investment group emerged on top with a bid of 135 billion rupees for the 75% stake on offer. It has an option to buy the remaining 25% in the coming months. “It was essential to make this process transparent because the biggest transaction of Pakistan’s history is about to take place,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif told his Cabinet in a televised statement as the bidding began. The rival bidders were a consortium led by Lucky Cement, which bid 134 billion rupees, and the private Pakistani carrier Air Blue, with 26.5 billion. The sale offer comes after last year’s failure to privatise PIA, with just one bid for US$36 million – far below the US$300 million to US$305 million wanted by the government. Before being delisted from the Pakistan stock exchange, the airline reported a net loss of US$437 million for the 2022 full year on revenue of US$854 million. Islamabad has promised to divest dozens of its cash-burning enterprises in the finance,

A PIA plane at Islamabad International Airport. – REUTERSPIC energy, industrial and retailing sectors by 2029 under a US$7 billion loan programme agreed with the International Monetary Fund last year. Many of the companies have incurred billions of dollars in losses because of mismanagement and corruption, forcing the government to inject funds to keep them afloat.

French designer Pierre Cardin in the 1960s. But its reputation suffered after racking up heavy losses as well as serious safety lapses. It was banned from flying to the European Union, Britain and the US in June 2020, a month after one of its Airbus A-320 jets crashed onto a Karachi street, killing nearly 100 people. Europe and Britain allowed PIA flights to resume this year, but operations have not yet resumed for the United States. Just 18 of its fleet of around 34 planes are in active service, according to officials. – AFP

Founded in 1955, PIA was a symbol of national pride and rapid growth for years, with a pathbreaking international network and even flight attendant uniforms created by