Swiss pharmaceutical giant enters the weight loss drug market! Roche acquires Carmot for $3.1 billion.
Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche has acquired weight loss drug developer Carmot Therapeutics for $3.1 billion, sparking competition in the global weight loss drug market. Roche will pay $2.7 billion as an initial payment, with the potential to pay up to an additional $400 million based on specific targets. Carmot's products include gut hormone candidate drugs for treating obesity in both diabetic and non-diabetic patients, with the most promising being CT-388, a GLP-1/GIP dual receptor agonist. Roche's goal is to make CT-388 the best obesity drug and compete with similar drugs from companies like Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly.
Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly will face a new competitor as the global weight loss drug market becomes increasingly competitive.
On Monday, December 4th, Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche announced that it has agreed to acquire weight loss drug developer Carmot Therapeutics for $3.1 billion, with an initial payment of $2.7 billion and the potential for an additional $400 million based on specific future targets.
Roche stated that Carmot's product portfolio includes a range of gut hormone candidate drugs, available in both pill and injectable forms, aimed at treating obesity in both diabetic and non-diabetic patients.
The most promising candidate drug from Carmot is CT-388, which belongs to a class of drugs known as GLP-1/GIP dual receptor agonists. It is administered once a week and has similar effects to Eli Lilly's diabetes drug Mounjaro and weight loss drug Zepbound.
According to Teresa Graham, head of Roche's pharmaceutical division, following encouraging results from phase one trials, Carmot's drug is ready for phase two human testing and may be launched in the 2030s.
Graham added that Roche's goal is not just to replace market-leading companies with lower-priced alternatives, but to make CT-388 the best obesity drug in the GLP-1 class, whether used alone or in combination with other drugs.
Although Carmot's drug is still in the early stages of development, this deal could lead to competition with similar drugs such as Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Eli Lilly's Zepbound.
After Roche's Alzheimer's drug failed in phase two clinical trials last year, the company faced a major setback. Since taking office, Roche's new CEO, Thomas Schinecker, has been seeking breakthroughs in multiple treatment areas and has been accelerating the pace of mergers and acquisitions.
In October of this year, Roche agreed to acquire Telavant for $7.1 billion. Telavant is a company that develops drugs for the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease.
There have been several recent acquisitions in the global weight loss drug market targeting development projects. For example, last month AstraZeneca agreed to purchase the patent rights for Chinese company Chengyi Biotechnology's GLP-1 drug ECC5004 for $2 billion. In July, Eli Lilly acquired Versanis for $1.93 billion to further expand its product line.