Eli Lilly said to have tapped National Resilience, BSP for Zepbound production

Eli Lilly (NYSE:LLY) has inked agreements with contract manufacturers National Resilience and BSP Pharmaceuticals to conduct the fill-and-finish process in the production of its weight loss therapy Zepbound, The Financial Times reported Tuesday.

The news comes months after the FDA authorized the GLP-1 agonist, also known as tirzepatide, for obesity late last year, allowing Indiana-based LLY to compete with its Danish rival, Novo Nordisk (NVO), in the lucrative weight loss drug market, which is expected to reach $100B by 2030.

U.S.-based National Resilience, which won $410M in loan financing from the Department of Defense (DOD) and the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation in 2023, is expected to fill Zepbound injector pens at its Cincinnati plant.

Meanwhile, the Italian CDMO BSP Pharma began setting up the equipment required to produce tirzepatide in H2 2023.

Its manufacturing site near Rome will be able to handle 61M injectable doses of non-cancer drugs by the end of 2025, while National Resilience’s Cincinnati plant is expected to have an annual production capacity of 200M doses by 2030.

Eli Lilly (LLY) didn’t confirm the details but added that the company collaborates with “an extensive portfolio of external contract manufacturers to accelerate production.” National Resilience and BSP Pharma refused to comment.

The agreement follows a $16.5B all-cash deal that Novo’s (NVO) parent inked last month to acquire U.S. contract manufacturer Catalent (CTLT) in a bid to support the production of NVO's weight loss therapies, Ozempic and Wegovy.