China’s Hangzhou Jiuyuan Gene Engineering has developed a biosimilar of Novo Nordisk’s popular diabetes drug Ozempic and applied for its approval.
According to a statement by news agency Reuters, the Chinese drugmaker said in a post on Wednesday on its official social media account that the drug application, Jiyoutai was for usage to control blood sugar in patients with type 2 diabetes.
An approval of Jiyoutai would make the injectible China’s first locally developed biosimilar semaglutide drug. A biosimilar drug has a structure that closely mimics an existing drug but is not exactly alike, Reuters reported.
Semaglutide, developed by Novo Nordisk, is the active ingredient in Ozempic as well as the Danish firm’s powerful weight-loss drug Wegovy. The application for approval by Jiuyuan Gene Engineering comes amid surging demand for semaglutide that far outpaces supply globally.
Jiuyuan Gene, which is majority-owned by China’s Huadong Medicine, completed a late-stage clinical trial in China last year comparing its semaglutide injection with Ozempic in a group of 476 patients, according to a clinical trials registry. It is noteworthy that the patent of the drug is not set to expire until 2026 but is contested in court.
Jiuyuan Gene Engineering collaborated with its top shareholder Huadong Medicine to develop another diabetes drug that is approved in China.
