Novo Nordisk CEO warns of layoffs as Wegovy challenge heats up
Novo Nordisk warned of ongoing competition from copycat versions of its obesity drug Wegovy and signaled possible layoffs due to slowing sales growth, especially in the U.S. The Danish drugmaker, which lost $95 billion in market value after cutting full-year forecasts, said over one million Americans still use compounded GLP-1 drugs despite a U.S. ban.
Reuters Novo Nordisk expects continued competition from copycat versions of its blockbuster Wegovy obesity drug this year and could face layoffs as it battles rising pressure from main U.S. rival Eli Lilly, the Danish drugmaker warned on Wednesday. Novo, which became Europe's most valuable company worth $650 billion last year on booming sales of Wegovy, is facing a pivotal moment as the medicine loses market share and sees sales growth slow, especially in the United States. It has warned of far slower growth this year - in part due to compounders who have been allowed to make copycat medicines based on the same ingredients as Wegovy due to shortages. Novo cut its full-year sales and profit forecasts last week, wiping $95 billion off its market value since. The shares were down 3.4% at 1350 GMT. The slide is a huge and abrupt turnaround for the firm that has been one of the world's hottest investment stories, which led to a rapid expansion of manufacturing and sales capacity. Now the firm is eyeing potential cost-cutting measures.
"We probably won't be able to avoid layoffs," outgoing CEO Lars Fruergaard Jorgensen told Danish broadcaster DR. "When you have to adjust a company, there are some areas where you have to have fewer people, some (areas) where you have to be smaller." He added, though, that any decision on layoffs would be in the hands of the incoming CEO, company veteran Maziar Mike Doustdar, who takes over on Thursday. On a media call, Jorgensen said the market for copycat versions of Wegovy's class of drugs - known as GLP-1 receptor agonists - was of "equal size to our business" and compounded versions of Wegovy were sold at a "much lower price point". In May, the company said it expected many of the roughly one million U.S. patients using compounded GLP-1 drugs to switch to branded treatments after a U.S. Food and Drug Administration ban on compounded copies of Wegovy took effect on May 22, and it expected compounding to wind down in the third quarter. However, finance chief Karsten Munk Knudsen said on Wednesday that more than one million U.S. patients were still using compounded GLP-1s and that Novo's lowered outlook has "not assumed a reduction in compounding" this year. "The obesity market is volatile," Knudsen told analysts when asked under what circumstances the company could see negative growth in the last six months of the year. The low end of Novo's new full-year guidance range would be for "unforeseen events", such as stronger pricing pressure in the U.S. than forecast, he said. The lower end of the range would imply sales around 150 billion Danish crowns ($23 billion) in the second half of 2025, compared with 157 billion in the same period last year. ENCOURAGING PRESCRIPTION DATA Knudsen reiterated that the company was pursuing multiple strategies, including lawsuits against compounding pharmacies, to halt unlawful mass compounding. Jorgensen said the company was encouraged by the latest U.S. prescription data for Wegovy. While the drug was overtaken earlier this year by rival Lilly's Zepbound in terms of U.S. prescriptions, that lead has narrowed in the past month. Second-quarter sales of Wegovy rose by 36% in the U.S. and more than quadrupled in markets outside the U.S. compared to a year ago, Novo said. While Wegovy's U.S. pricing held steady in the quarter, the company expected deeper erosion in the key U.S. market in the second half, due to a greater portion of sales expected from the direct-to-consumer or cash-pay channel, as well as higher rebates and discounts to insurers, Knudsen said. He said Novo was expanding its U.S. direct-to-consumer platform, NovoCare, launched in March, and may need to pursue similar "cash sales" directly to patients, outside of insurance channels, in some markets outside the United States. COST CUTS The company reiterated its full-year earnings expectations on Wednesday after last week's profit warning. Jorgensen said Novo was acting to "ensure efficiencies in our cost base" as the company announced it would terminate eight R&D projects. "There seems to be a larger R&D clean-out than usual, but we do not know if this reflects a strategic re-assessment or just a coincidence," Jefferies analysts said in a note. Investors have questioned whether Novo can stay competitive in the booming weight-loss drug market. Several equity analysts have cut their price targets and recommendation on the stock since last week. Shares in Novo plunged 30% last week - their worst weekly performance in over two decades. Sales rose 18% in the second quarter to 76.86 billion Danish crowns, below analysts' initial expectations.
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Economic Times
14 minutes ago
- Economic Times
How older people are reaping brain benefits from new tech
NYT News Service It started with a high school typing course. Wanda Woods enrolled because her father advised that typing proficiency would lead to jobs. Sure enough, the federal Environmental Protection Agency hired her as an after-school worker while she was still a junior. Her supervisor "sat me down and put me on a machine called a word processor," Woods, now 67, recalled. "It was big and bulky and used magnetic cards to store information. I thought, 'I kinda like this.'" Decades later, she was still liking it. In 2012 -- the first year that more than half of Americans over 65 used the internet -- she started a computer training business. Now she is an instructor with Senior Planet in Denver, an AARP-supported effort to help older people learn and stay abreast of technology. Woods has no plans to retire. Staying involved with tech "keeps me in the know, too," she said. Some neuroscientists researching the effects of technology on older adults are inclined to agree. The first cohort of seniors to have contended -- not always enthusiastically -- with a digital society has reached the age when cognitive impairment becomes more common. Given decades of alarms about technology's threats to our brains and well-being -- sometimes called "digital dementia" -- one might expect to start seeing negative effects. The opposite appears true. "Among the digital pioneer generation, use of everyday digital technology has been associated with reduced risk of cognitive impairment and dementia," said Michael Scullin, a cognitive neuroscientist at Baylor University. It's almost akin to hearing from a nutritionist that bacon is good for you. "It flips the script that technology is always bad," said Dr. Murali Doraiswamy, director of the Neurocognitive Disorders Program at Duke University, who was not involved with the study. "It's refreshing and provocative and poses a hypothesis that deserves further research." Scullin and Jared Benge, a neuropsychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, were co-authors of a recent analysis investigating the effects of technology use on people over 50 (average age: 69). They found that those who used computers, smartphones, the internet or a mix did better on cognitive tests, with lower rates of cognitive impairment or dementia diagnoses, than those who avoided technology or used it less often. "Normally, you see a lot of variability across studies," Scullin said. But in this analysis of 57 studies involving more than 411,000 seniors, published in Nature Human Behavior, almost 90% of the studies found that technology had a protective cognitive effect. Much of the apprehension about technology and cognition arose from research on children and adolescents, whose brains are still developing. "There's pretty compelling data that difficulties can emerge with attention or mental health or behavioral problems" when young people are overexposed to screens and digital devices, Scullin said. Older adults' brains are also malleable, but less so. And those who began grappling with technology in midlife had already learned "foundational abilities and skills," Scullin said. Then, to participate in a swiftly evolving society, they had to learn a whole lot more. Years of online brain-training experiments that last a few weeks or months have produced varying results. Often, they improve the ability to perform the task in question without enhancing other skills. "I tend to be pretty skeptical" of their benefit, said Walter Boot, a psychologist at the Center on Aging and Behavioral Research at Weill Cornell Medicine. "Cognition is really hard to change." The new analysis, however, reflects "technology use in the wild," he said, with adults "having to adapt to a rapidly changing technological environment" over several decades. He found the study's conclusions "plausible." Analyses like this can't determine causality. Does technology improve older people's cognition, or do people with low cognitive ability avoid technology? Is tech adoption just a proxy for enough wealth to buy a laptop? "We still don't know if it's chicken or egg," Doraiswamy said. Yet when Scullin and Benge accounted for health, education, socioeconomic status and other demographic variables, they still found significantly higher cognitive ability among older digital technology users. What might explain the apparent connection? "These devices represent complex new challenges," Scullin said. "If you don't give up on them, if you push through the frustration, you're engaging in the same challenges that studies have shown to be cognitively beneficial." Even handling the constant updates, the troubleshooting and the sometimes maddening new operating systems might prove advantageous. "Having to re learn something is another positive mental challenge," he said. Still, digital technology may also protect brain health by fostering social connections, known to help stave off cognitive decline. Or its reminders and prompts could partially compensate for memory loss, as Scullin and Benge found in a smartphone study, while its apps help preserve functional abilities like shopping and banking. Numerous studies have shown that while the number of people with dementia is increasing as the population ages, the proportion of older adults who develop dementia has been falling in the United States and in several European countries. Researchers have attributed the decline to a variety of factors, including reduced smoking, higher education levels and better blood pressure treatments. Possibly, Doraiswamy said, engaging with technology has been part of the pattern. Of course, digital technologies present risks, too. Online fraud and scams target older adults, and while they are less apt to report fraud losses than younger people, the amounts they lose are much higher, according to the Federal Trade Commission. Disinformation poses its own hazards. And as with users of any age, more is not necessarily better. "If you're bingeing Netflix 10 hours a day, you may lose social connections," Doraiswamy pointed out. Technology, he noted, cannot "substitute for other brain-healthy activities" like exercising and eating sensibly. Elevate your knowledge and leadership skills at a cost cheaper than your daily tea. Can Coforge's ambition to lead the IT Industry become a reality? 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Time of India
14 minutes ago
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How older people are reaping brain benefits from new tech
Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads It started with a high school typing course. Wanda Woods enrolled because her father advised that typing proficiency would lead to jobs. Sure enough, the federal Environmental Protection Agency hired her as an after-school worker while she was still a supervisor "sat me down and put me on a machine called a word processor," Woods , now 67, recalled. "It was big and bulky and used magnetic cards to store information. I thought, 'I kinda like this.'"Decades later, she was still liking it. In 2012 -- the first year that more than half of Americans over 65 used the internet -- she started a computer training she is an instructor with Senior Planet in Denver, an AARP-supported effort to help older people learn and stay abreast of technology. Woods has no plans to retire. Staying involved with tech "keeps me in the know, too," she neuroscientists researching the effects of technology on older adults are inclined to agree. The first cohort of seniors to have contended -- not always enthusiastically -- with a digital society has reached the age when cognitive impairment becomes more decades of alarms about technology's threats to our brains and well-being -- sometimes called "digital dementia" -- one might expect to start seeing negative opposite appears true. "Among the digital pioneer generation, use of everyday digital technology has been associated with reduced risk of cognitive impairment and dementia," said Michael Scullin , a cognitive neuroscientist at Baylor almost akin to hearing from a nutritionist that bacon is good for you."It flips the script that technology is always bad," said Dr. Murali Doraiswamy , director of the Neurocognitive Disorders Program at Duke University, who was not involved with the study. "It's refreshing and provocative and poses a hypothesis that deserves further research."Scullin and Jared Benge , a neuropsychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, were co-authors of a recent analysis investigating the effects of technology use on people over 50 (average age: 69).They found that those who used computers, smartphones, the internet or a mix did better on cognitive tests, with lower rates of cognitive impairment or dementia diagnoses, than those who avoided technology or used it less often."Normally, you see a lot of variability across studies," Scullin said. But in this analysis of 57 studies involving more than 411,000 seniors, published in Nature Human Behavior, almost 90% of the studies found that technology had a protective cognitive of the apprehension about technology and cognition arose from research on children and adolescents, whose brains are still developing."There's pretty compelling data that difficulties can emerge with attention or mental health or behavioral problems" when young people are overexposed to screens and digital devices, Scullin adults' brains are also malleable, but less so. And those who began grappling with technology in midlife had already learned "foundational abilities and skills," Scullin to participate in a swiftly evolving society, they had to learn a whole lot of online brain-training experiments that last a few weeks or months have produced varying results. Often, they improve the ability to perform the task in question without enhancing other skills."I tend to be pretty skeptical" of their benefit, said Walter Boot, a psychologist at the Center on Aging and Behavioral Research at Weill Cornell Medicine. "Cognition is really hard to change."The new analysis, however, reflects "technology use in the wild," he said, with adults "having to adapt to a rapidly changing technological environment" over several decades. He found the study's conclusions "plausible."Analyses like this can't determine causality. Does technology improve older people's cognition, or do people with low cognitive ability avoid technology? 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Or its reminders and prompts could partially compensate for memory loss, as Scullin and Benge found in a smartphone study, while its apps help preserve functional abilities like shopping and studies have shown that while the number of people with dementia is increasing as the population ages, the proportion of older adults who develop dementia has been falling in the United States and in several European have attributed the decline to a variety of factors, including reduced smoking, higher education levels and better blood pressure treatments. Possibly, Doraiswamy said, engaging with technology has been part of the course, digital technologies present risks, too. Online fraud and scams target older adults, and while they are less apt to report fraud losses than younger people, the amounts they lose are much higher, according to the Federal Trade Commission. Disinformation poses its own as with users of any age, more is not necessarily better."If you're bingeing Netflix 10 hours a day, you may lose social connections," Doraiswamy pointed out. Technology, he noted, cannot "substitute for other brain-healthy activities" like exercising and eating sensibly.
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Business Standard
44 minutes ago
- Business Standard
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By Vince Golle and Craig Stirling US consumers probably experienced a slight pickup in underlying inflation in July as retailers gradually raised prices on a variety of items subject to higher import duties. The core consumer price index, regarded as a measure of underlying inflation because it strips out volatile food and energy costs, rose 0.3 per cent in July, according to the median projection in a Bloomberg survey of economists. In June, core CPI edged up 0.2 per cent from the prior month. While that would be the biggest gain since the start of the year, Americans — at least those who drive — are finding some offset at the gas pump. Cheaper gasoline probably helped limit the overall CPI to a 0.2 per cent gain, the government's report on Tuesday is expected to show. Higher US tariffs have started to filter through to consumers in categories such as household furnishings and recreational goods. But a separate measure of core services inflation has so far remained tame. Still, many economists expect higher import duties to keep gradually feeding through. That's the dilemma for Federal Reserve officials who've kept interest rates unchanged this year in hopes of gaining clarity on whether tariffs will lead to sustained inflation. At the same time, the labor market — the other half of their dual policy mandate — is showing signs of losing momentum. As concerns build about the durability of the job market, many companies are exploring ways to limit the tariff pass-through to price-sensitive consumers. Economists expect government figures on Friday to show a solid gain in July retail sales as incentives helped fuel vehicle purchases and Amazon's Prime Day sale drew in online shoppers. What Bloomberg Economics Says: 'One reason firms are having trouble hiking prices is that households' real disposable income growth has been dismal — running at a third of the pandemic peak. Incorporating payroll revisions, we estimate that real income growth actually contracted in June. Yet nominal retail sales were likely robust in July. We caution against equating a strong headline print with resilient consumption.' —Anna Wong, Stuart Paul, Eliza Winger, Estelle Ou and Chris G. Collins, economists. Excluding auto dealers, economists have penciled in a more moderate advance. And when adjusted for price changes, the retail sales figures will likely underscore an uninspiring consumer spending environment. Among other economic data in the coming week, a Fed report is likely to show stagnant factory output as manufacturers contend with evolving tariffs policy. A preliminary trade truce between the US and China is set to expire on Tuesday, but a move to extend the detente is still possible. The Bank of Canada will release a summary of the deliberations that led it to hold its benchmark rate at 2.75 per cent for a third consecutive meeting; it also left the door open to more cuts if the economy weakens and inflation is contained. Home sales data for July will reveal whether sales gains continued for a third straight month. Elsewhere, several Chinese data releases, gross domestic product readings for the UK and Switzerland, and a possible rate cut in Australia are among the highlights. Asia Asia has a hectic data calendar, led by a wave of Chinese indicators, GDP reports from several economies, and a closely-watched rate decision in Australia. The week will see credit numbers from China, which will be assessed for signs that policymakers' efforts to revive economic growth are beginning to bear fruit. Money supply data will offer a complementary signal on underlying liquidity conditions. On Tuesday, the Reserve Bank of Australia is poised to lower policy rates for a third time this year after second-quarter inflation cooled further. A gauge of Australian business confidence due the same day will offer a timely read on sentiment heading into the second half. Wednesday brings Australia's wages data, followed by the employment report on Thursday. India reports CPI data on Tuesday, which will likely show prices cooled further in July from a year ago. Wholesale prices follow on Thursday, and will indicate whether cost pass-through remains muted. Trade figures during the week will show how strong India's external sector was before Trump imposed an additional 25 per cent tariff on Indian goods over its ongoing purchases of Russian energy, taking the total import levy to 50 per cent. On Wednesday, Thailand's central bank is expected to cut rates amid subdued price pressures and weak economic growth. The same day, New Zealand releases retail card spending data, South Korea publishes its unemployment rate for July, and Japan releases its producer price index — a gauge of wholesale inflation. China's big reveal comes on Friday, with a suite of July activity data including industrial production, retail sales, fixed asset investment, and jobless figures. Also on Friday, Japan publishes preliminary estimates of second-quarter GDP, with forecasts suggesting the country likely avoided a recession. Europe, Middle East, Africa The UK will take prominence again with some key data reports. Following Thursday's Bank of England rate cut, after which officials said they're on 'alert' for second-round effects from a spike in inflation, wage data will be released on Tuesday. Economists anticipate a slight slowdown in pay growth for private-sector workers. Meanwhile, second-quarter GDP is expected to show economic momentum slowing sharply after a growth spurt at the start of the year, meshing with the BOE's view that the economy has started to show more slack. Much of continental Europe will be on holiday on Friday, and data may be sparse too. Germany's ZEW index of investor sentiment comes on Tuesday. In the wider euro region, a second take of GDP, along with June industrial production, will be published on Thursday. In Switzerland, still reeling from Trump's imposition of a 39 per cent tariff, initial data on Friday may reveal that the economy suddenly contracted in the second quarter, even before that trade shock hit. Norwegian inflation is set for Monday. Three days later, the central bank in Oslo is likely to keep its rate at 4.25 per cent after its first post-pandemic cut in June surprised investors. Recent data included weaker retail sales, rising unemployment and gloomier industrial sentiment, though price pressures have also appeared to be stickier. Most economists expect two more quarter-point cuts in Norway this year, in September and December. Some monetary decisions are also due in Africa: On Tuesday, Kenya's central bank will probably adjust the key rate lower for a seventh straight time, from 9.75 per cent, with inflation expected to remain below the 5 per cent midpoint of its target range in the near term. Uganda's policymakers will probably leave their rate at 9.75 per cent to gauge the impact of US tariffs on inflation and keep local debt and swaps attractive to investors. On Wednesday, the Bank of Zambia may cut borrowing costs. Its real interest rate is the highest in six years, with the spread between the policy benchmark and the annual inflation rate at 1.5 percentage points in July after price growth eased. Namibia may also lower its rate, to 6.5 per cent from 6.75 per cent, in a bid to boost the economy. Inflation there is near the floor of its 3 per cent to 6 per cent target range. In Russia on Wednesday, analysts expect inflation to have fallen below 9 per cent in July from 9.4 per cent a month earlier. Turkish central bank Governor Fatih Karahan will present the latest 2025 inflation outlook at a quarterly meeting on Thursday. And finally, on Friday in Israel, inflation is expected to have eased to 3.1 per cent in July from 3.3 per cent a month earlier. Latin America Brazil's central bank gets the week rolling with its Focus survey of market expectations. Analysts have been slowly trimming their consumer price forecasts, but all estimates remain well above the 3 per cent target through the forecast horizon. Data on Tuesday should show that Brazilian consumer prices for July ticked down ever so slightly from June's 5.35 per cent print, substantiating the central bank's hawkish rate hold at 15 per cent on July 30. Chile's central bank on Wednesday publishes the minutes of its July 29 meeting, at which policymakers delivered their first cut of 2025, voting unanimously for a quarter-point reduction, to 4.75 per cent. The post-decision statement maintained guidance for more monetary easing in the coming quarters due to a weak labor market and slowing inflation. Also due on Wednesday is Argentina's July consumer prices report. Analysts surveyed by the central bank expect a slight uptick in the monthly reading from June's 1.6 per cent, with the year-on-year figure drifting lower from 39.4 per cent. Inflation in Peru's megacity capital of Lima has been below the 2 per cent midpoint of the central bank's target range all year, but the early consensus expects the central bank to keep its key rate unchanged at 4.5 per cent for a third straight meeting. Colombia is all but certain to have posted an eighth straight quarter of growth in the three months through June. The nation's central bank, which in June highlighted that the economy had gained momentum, is forecasting a 2.7 per cent rise in GDP this year and 2.9 per cent in 2026, up from 1.7 per cent in 2024.
