Amgen has reported that its once-monthly dosing regimen and manufacturing capabilities will be key to entering the obesity market.
Presenting at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference 2025 on 13 January, Amgen's CEO Robert Bradway asked potential investors not to think of MariTide (maridebart cafraglutide) as the third main weight loss candidate on the market.
"I hope we will be the world's first long-acting therapy in the treatment of obesity and obesity-related conditions. It's been an objective of the field for many years, to have a long-acting treatment option for type 2 diabetics (T2D)," Bradway explains.
"We feel the prospect of being able to offer patients a monthly or less frequent alternative is going to be very attractive in patients with T2D, in patients with obesity and overweight and in patients with various other diseases that we intend to study in the Phase III clinical programme for this medicine."
Following the JP Morgan presentation, Amgen's stock saw a slight increase of 3.03%, from a market close of $262.23 on 10 January to a market close of $270.19 on 13 January. The California-based biopharma has a market cap of $145.42bn.
In November 2024, Amgen presented Phase II data from its obesity candidate MariTide, a bispecific glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide receptor (GIPR) antagonist. If approved, it could boast a once-monthly dosing regimen, which is far more attractive than the once-weekly dosing of its main rivals Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Eli Lilly's Zepbound.
The Phase II trial (NCT05669599) investigated the candidate in patients living with obesity or overweight without T2D where MariTide demonstrated up to 20% average weight loss at week 52 without a weight loss plateau.
The trial also investigated the drug in patients with obesity or overweight and T2D, who typically lose less weight on GLP-1 therapies, achieved up to 17% average weight loss, also without a weight loss plateau, and lowered their average haemoglobin A1C (HbA1c) by up to 2.2 percentage points at week 52.
Despite what Amgen said was "positive data", shareholders were less convinced, and shares dropped by 4.8% after the data was released.
Before the Phase II data was announced, the company suffered another share drop after concerns related to bone mineral density (BMD) loss with MariTide were raised by an analyst prompting a $12bn market wipe. Amgen attempted to put investors' minds at ease, claiming that the company has not seen an association between the administration of MariTide and BMD changes. In the Phase II data update, the company reiterated it did not have any BMD concerns.