In a surprise double announcement Tuesday, Novo reduced sales guidance by 5%—attributing the change to slowed growth of its semaglutide franchise in the U.S.—and named current international operations head Maziar Mike Doustdar as its new president and CEO.
When you’re at the top, they say the only way to go is down. After taking the world by storm in the past few years with its obesity and diabetes blockbuster semaglutide, Novo Nordisk has since been subject to stiff competition from primary rival Eli Lilly, and on Tuesday, the Danish pharma lowered 2025 sales expectations by 5%.
The new forecast, which comes a week ahead of Novo’s Q2 earnings report, drops the company’s expected sales revenue for the year to 8%–14% from the 13%–21% set in May. The change is driven by lower growth expectations for Wegovy (semaglutide in obesity) and Ozempic (semaglutide in diabetes) in the U.S. market, in addition to “lower penetration for Wegovy in select [international operations] markets,” according to the company’s Tuesday press release.
In a Tuesday morning note, analysts at BMO Capital Markets wrote that the lowered sales guidance points to “continued weakness across the incretin business” and “continued incretin pressure, specifically in the US for both Wegovy and Ozempic.”
In a parallel release, Novo announced a new leader to help contend with any potential market fallout from the first announcement. Maziar Mike Doustdar will take over as president and CEO of the company on August 7. Doustdar replaces Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, whose sudden exit in May after eight years as Novo’s CEO caused one analyst on a conference call at the time to worry that “there’s something pretty wrong here.”
Doustdar currently serves as Novo’s executive vice president of international operations. Over his decade of leadership, the division, which employs nearly 20,000 people, has “more than doubled sales,” according to the press release.
“This is an important moment for Novo Nordisk,” Helge Lund, Novo Nordisk chair, said in a prepared statement. “The market is developing rapidly, and the company needs to address recent market challenges with speed and ambition. I believe Novo Nordisk will build on its strengths as a global leader in obesity and diabetes, and Mike has a clear vision of how to unlock the full potential of the opportunities ahead.”
One market challenge for Novo is the strength of Lilly’s competing GLP-1 obesity drug Zepbound. In May, data from the Phase IIIb SURMOUNT-5 study showed that patients on Zepbound lost more weight than those taking Wegovy and that the drugs were equally safe. More recently, Novo was the subject of a widely publicized breakup with telehealth player Hims & Hers Health that reignited the row over compounded GLP-1 drugs.
BMO referred to Doustdar’s hiring as “the good” part of Novo’s double surprise announcement. “We think the global perspective of a non-Danish CEO could re-energize and refocus the struggling strategy,” the analysts wrote.
