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Eli Lilly factory in New Jersey: Another fifth more
Photo: Mike Segar / REUTERS
After the start of sales of its weight loss product, the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly expects another jump in sales in 2024. To the surprise of analysts who had expected a less euphoric outlook - the share price rose by 3.5 percent premarket. In 2023, Novo Nordisk's competitor benefited primarily from the most important driver, the diabetes drug Mounjaro with the active ingredient tirzepatide. The same active ingredient is in Lilly's weight loss product Zepbound, which has been available to significantly more people in the USA since November. Experts expect this to become the best-selling drug in the world.
Revenues are expected to rise to between $40.4 and $41.6 billion in 2024, the company announced on Tuesday. That would be around a fifth more after sales climbed to $34.1 billion in 2023. Mounjaro alone contributed almost 5.2 billion dollars to total sales - after less than 500 million a year earlier.
Eli Lilly's profits fell by 16 percent to $5.2 billion in 2023. This reflected high burdens in connection with recent takeovers as well as increased research and development costs.
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