Novo Nordisk (NVO) and more specifically its blockbuster weight-loss drugs Ozempic and Wagovy have been the topic of many conversations across Wall Street and well beyond this year, due to the company's financial performance driven by its success in helping people tackle both diabetes and being overweight. It is that impact and buzz that Yahoo Finance has chosen to name Novo Nordisk its 2023 Company of the Year. Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Fruergaard Jorgensen sits down with Yahoo Finance Senior Health Reporter Anjalee Khemlani to discuss the company's progress throughout the past year and what it expects to see for the future.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live.

Video Transcript

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Novo Nordisk became Europe's most valuable company this year, thanks to the seemingly overnight popularity of its drugs Ozempic and Wegovy. So it's no surprise that we named the Danish pharmaceutical giant as our company of the year for 2023. Yahoo Finance health reporter Anjalee Khemlani was able to sit down with Novo Nordisk CEO to discuss being named company of the year, the company's recent successes, and much, much more. Let's take a listen.

LARS FRUERGAARD JORGENSEN: It's obviously a great honor to get that prestigious prize. And in many ways, it's a good picture of a fantastic year for Novo Nordisk and actually a number of years where we've seen a very dramatic growth and all based on some really interesting and fascinating innovation we've been doing for many, many years. So we're really pleased to be in this wonderful spot.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Absolutely. And this is, of course, because of Ozempic, Wegovy-- the GLP-1 products that have had astounding weight loss results for people. It's funny to me because Ozempic was approved in 2017, Wegovy in 2021. Are you surprised by the fact that a couple of years after or several years after this approval, you're suddenly seeing this delayed success?

LARS FRUERGAARD JORGENSEN: It's a great question, because we have been researching in this for many decades. We have done research for more than 25 years. We have all along felt that it was a really meaningful focus area for us to have. Being a leader in diabetes care and knowing that many of those who develop type 2 diabetes, they develop it because of overweight. So why treat the disease if you can actually prevent it by addressing the underlying causes?

But we also know that for many years, anti-obesity medicine was not widely used. And they were not all delivering up against patients' and physicians' expectations. So we saw with our latest innovation that we really-- perhaps for the first time, met those expectations. And a lot of discussion was ongoing about, OK. Now there's finally an efficacious treatment for people living with obesity.

And then suddenly, the whole market takes off. And that's really fascinating. But it also comes with a lot of hard work because we have to scale up and ramp up manufacturing like we have never done before. But it's all really exciting. And I feel so proud on behalf of all the great colleagues and really committed employees in Novo Nordisk. And it's really a credit-- when we're getting this prize, it's really credit to all of those who go to work each and every day focused on helping patients.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Yeah. I'm so glad you brought up the manufacturing. You're investing a lot in that. About $4 billion for the upcoming years to expand manufacturing almost directly as a result of this. But do you feel like you may be over-investing considering that there are competitors coming down the pike? There are so many others that are going to be in this space soon. Do you feel like you're on the right track with this?

LARS FRUERGAARD JORGENSEN: I believe we are ramping up as needed. And if you think about it, WHO predicts that by 2030, there will be a billion people living with obesity. And so far, we're just scratching the surface of what that means in terms of bringing them efficacious medicines.

In the US, there's more than 100 million with a BMI above 30. So there's room for competition, there's room for choice. As long as products stay safe and they get say, well above 15% in weight loss, I think you can have a serious play. And we have a very strong pipeline coming. We are already now in late stage development of our next generation product.

We know what will be moving into the pipeline in the coming years in terms of even stronger products. So for us, this is a long term journey of getting to more and more patients. And I think we have maybe one of the best opportunities in driving population and health intervention. And really, preventing some of the comorbidities that follows living with obesity. And I think that's a great value add for the individual patient.

It's great for society, for the health systems that are struggling in most countries. Aging populations and a number of burdens on governments, driving green transition, handing aging population, and also now spending increasingly on defense, et cetera. So really, investing in medicines that can drive prevention and improve health outcomes is living the purpose of a company like Novo Nordisk. And we're really proud about what contribution we can have in that space.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Yeah. It's such an interesting story because you were known for insulin for so long and now this expansion, you're giving Wall Street the diversity it has craved for the company's portfolio for so long. But you've also found yourself sort of in the common culture with the mass population that recognition of the brand, probably not what you want with everyone just calling everything Ozempic.

But at least they are recognizing the brand name. So I wonder how that's been for you. Knowing that this became sort of celebrity culture. And you know, it's been everywhere this year.

LARS FRUERGAARD JORGENSEN: Yeah. It's a big change. I've been with the company for more than 30 years. I'm only the fifth CEO in a 100-year-old company. And now we're growing around 30% 100 years into our lifetime. And suddenly, we have brands that are becoming household names. And we've never ever had products that were like widely known.

So I think it causes some challenges how to handle that, but also drives a lot of opportunity. And if you think about, as I mentioned before, over some time, hundreds of millions of patients living with obesity and for us to get to them, if we had to have a huge sales force to go to each and every person, we would never be able to get to many of them.

But with brands being established, there's a different opportunity of actually reaching more patients. And again, when we can drive health resilience, stronger health outcomes by doing that, is actually really, really nice to have brands that leads patients to seek care because we can drive even bigger change than what we could have done if these were not well-established brands.

So it causes a lot of change for us. We have to face different challenges. But I see it really as a big opportunity for helping society and get to many more patients than we've ever done so far in the history of the company.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Yeah. It's really interesting because you have-- you're sort of like a fashion house now. You have to deal with knockoffs, especially while you still have the shortage ongoing. So that must be an interesting position. But I want to talk about the company itself. It's got an interesting corporate structure.

We know that you were recently compared to even what's going on with OpenAI and having a very different corporate structure. How does that get affected with this success? Who wins at the end of the day? And how do you personally feel about how the success is impacting the company?

LARS FRUERGAARD JORGENSEN: I would say that what we do inside the company has not changed at all. So I mentioned that we've been researching in obesity for 25 years, that continues. We've been producing medicines for people living with diabetes and a few other diseases for 100 years.

So the activities inside the company continues. We have an ownership structure that's interesting in the sense that we're controlled by a foundation. So the founders of Novo Nordisk actually gave control of the company to a foundation because they felt that that would be the best long term ownership for the company.

And then, of course, we are listed on the stock market. So we have the discipline that comes from being listed company and assessing-- the market is assessing our performance on a daily basis. But then we also have this stable anchor in the foundation, which has a controlling stake. And they have really a forever mindset in what we do.

And that's a bit how we look at our business. That we're in this forever. So we're not chasing short term returns. But we're really trying to build value for the long term with an eye for the social responsibility. We have the environmental responsibility, we have-- and, of course, staying healthy company from a financial point of view. So these triple bottom lines we pursue is kind of guiding everything we do. And I think that creates a very good long term perspective and a balance of succeeding as a company, but also adding value to the society we serve.