Novo Nordisk Partners with Vivtex in Up to $2.1B Oral Obesity Drug Deal

Novo Nordisk partnered with MIT spinout Vivtex in a deal worth up to $2.1 billion to develop next-generation oral biologic drugs for obesity and diabetes.

Novo Nordisk has entered into a partnership with Boston-based biotechnology company Vivtex to develop next-generation oral obesity drugs for diabetes and associated comorbidities, in a deal potentially worth up to $2.1 billion. The collaboration comes as the Danish pharmaceutical giant seeks to bolster its pipeline following disappointing clinical results for its next-generation obesity asset CagriSema, which failed to outperform Eli Lilly's Zepbound in a head-to-head study.

Under the agreement, Vivtex will license select oral drug-delivery technologies to Novo Nordisk and is eligible to receive upfront consideration, research funding and milestone payments totalling up to $2.1 billion, plus tiered royalties on future product sales. Novo Nordisk will lead global development, regulatory activities, manufacturing and commercialization of any resulting products.

The partnership aims to enable oral delivery of biologic drug candidates that are traditionally limited to injectable administration due to poor absorption in the gastrointestinal tract. Vivtex, co-founded by renowned MIT scientists Robert Langer, Giovanni Traverso and Thomas von Erlach, has developed a proprietary gastrointestinal screening and formulation platform combining high-throughput experimentation with AI-enabled analytics. The platform can screen thousands of formulations daily using "gut-on-a-chip" technology that mimics human intestinal function.

"This partnership combines Novo Nordisk's deep expertise in peptide and protein therapeutics with Vivtex's proprietary gastrointestinal screening platform to identify next-generation oral therapeutics," said Brian Vandahl, senior vice president of Therapeutics Discovery at Novo Nordisk. Thomas von Erlach, CEO and co-founder of Vivtex, added that the collaboration allows them to apply their platform across important metabolic disease areas "with the goal of enabling oral therapies that would otherwise require injection." 

The deal represents Novo Nordisk's latest move to strengthen its position in the competitive obesity market, where it currently trails Eli Lilly in both clinical efficacy and market share. Earlier this week, Novo Nordisk also announced it would slash US prices of its GLP-1 drugs by up to 50% starting in 2027.