Eli Lilly’s oral GLP-1 weight-loss medication Foundayo was prescribed 7,335 times in the United States during its fourth week on the market, according to prescription tracking cited by analysts. That level of weekly scripts represents a modest initial uptake compared with rival Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy, which launched earlier this year and holds a first-mover position in the oral weight-loss market.
Analysts tracking early script activity pointed to the raw weekly count as an imperfect gauge of longer-term demand. Trung Huynh of RBC Capital Markets said that, despite weaker week-four prescription numbers for Foundayo, investors are beginning to look beyond those immediate weekly script metrics when assessing the drug’s future potential.
Investors, the analysts noted, are betting that the next generation of oral weight-loss therapies will enlarge the eligible patient population to millions and provide a buffer against pricing pressure. Lilly executives reported last week that Foundayo already has more than 8,000 prescribers, with roughly one-third of those prescribers not having written an oral GLP-1 prescription previously. Lilly also said over 20,000 patients have been treated with Foundayo so far.
Huynh warned that weekly prescriptions for Foundayo need to increase substantially in short order to align with market expectations. He quantified the requirement at about 22,000 prescriptions per week for Foundayo to reach the consensus forecast of $160 million in sales for the second quarter.
Foundayo received U.S. approval on April 1. Prescriptions were accepted immediately through LillyDirect, with shipping beginning on April 6. Broader availability through U.S. retail pharmacies and telehealth providers began on April 9.
Analysts relied on prescription figures from IQVIA, which compiles retail prescription data and includes samples from telehealth services, LillyDirect distributions, and mail-order prescriptions. Two analysts highlighted potential gaps in telehealth prescription coverage within the IQVIA dataset, which could cause weekly Foundayo prescription counts to fluctuate as reporting samples adjust.
Lilly has said more than a dozen major telehealth firms are offering Foundayo, and those telehealth providers represent about 35% of launch volume, according to the company.
Market context and operational notes
The introduction timeline - approval on April 1, initial shipping on April 6, and wider retail and telehealth availability beginning April 9 - frames the early weeks of Foundayo’s commercial rollout. Prescription-tracking services that mix retail data with sampled telehealth and direct channels may undercount or mis-time portions of launch volume, producing week-to-week variation in reported scripts.