Boehringer Ingelheim, Terns, Viking may join market

Drugmakers have been scrambling to join a two-horse race to lead the market for popular weight loss drugs, which could be worth tens of billions in less than a decade.

Demand is only expected to grow, leaving room in the segment for lesser-known weight loss drug hopefuls such as the privately held German drugmaker Boehringer Ingelheim and smaller public companies such as Terns Pharmaceuticals, Viking Therapeutics and Structure Therapeutics.

The next entrants into the booming market have a key window of opportunity in the coming years: Goldman Sachs analysts expect 15 million U.S. adults to be on obesity medications by 2030.

During the JPMorgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco last week, attendees flocked to hear Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly – the two dominant players in the weight loss drug space – speak about what to expect this year from their blockbuster weight loss drugs. Demand for those treatments soared, and they slipped into shortages over the last year, as they helped patients shed significant weight over time.

Other large drugmakers such as Pfizer — which has a widely followed but so far ill-fated weight loss drug program — Amgen, Roche and AstraZeneca also outlined their strategies for joining the market. 

But other companies with weight loss drug ambitions have garnered less attention throughout the recent weight loss drug industry gold rush. They may soon compete with the larger players.

Here are some of the lesser-known businesses angling to enter the market.

Boehringer Ingelheim is developing a weight loss drug with Danish biotech firm Zealand Pharma. That company has been working on obesity treatments for nearly a decade. 

Their experimental drug works by targeting two gut hormones: GLP-1 to suppress appetite, and…