On January 23rd, Novo Nordisk announced a cooperation and licensing agreement with EraCal Therapeutics to develop and commercialize EraCal as a weight loss oral small molecule drug.
It is reported that this small molecule drug was discovered by Eracal's zebrafish phenotype screening platform and can target an innovative mechanism of controlling appetite and weight to treat obesity. At present, Novo Nordisk has not disclosed specific information about the project. EraCal is a Swiss biotechnology company based on phenotype drug discovery technology, jointly established by Harvard University and the University of Zurich. In 2022, EraCal reached a research collaboration with Novo Nordisk.
According to the agreement, Novo Nordisk will receive exclusive rights to develop and commercialize the project, while EraCal is eligible for a prepayment of up to 235 million euros, milestone payments for development and commercialization, and royalties after the product is launched and sold.
At the JPM annual meeting held in January, in response to the production capacity challenges faced by the diabetes and obesity sectors, the CEO of Novo Nordisk stated that the company plans to significantly increase production in 2024 and will continue to build production capacity in the coming years. (He Xinyi)