Novozymes spun off from Novo Nordisk, leaving drugmaker under foundation control
The split separated an enzyme business from the maker of Ozempic and Wegovy, but no effect on the supply, price or availability of those medicines has been reported.
Novozymes, the enzyme business built inside Novo Nordisk, was spun off from the pharmaceutical company, separating the industrial enzymes operation from the drugmaker that makes Ozempic and Wegovy [1]. Both trace back to the same Danish foundation structure, and Novo Nordisk remains under the control of Novo Holdings A/S, which is wholly owned by the Novo Nordisk Foundation [1].
Who controls the company
Novo Holdings holds approximately 28.1% of Novo Nordisk's shares and a majority of its voting shares, 77.1%, giving the foundation effective control of the drugmaker [1]. Novo Nordisk itself was created in 1989 through a merger of two Danish companies, Novo Terapeutisk Laboratorium and Nordisk Gentofte A/S, whose origins go back to the 1920s [1]. The company began its US presence in 1982 through a joint venture with Squibb Corporation and introduced its first insulin pen, the Novopen, in 1985 [1].
The year Novozymes was separated from Novo Nordisk has not been reported [1]. What Novozymes' ownership looks like today has also not been disclosed [1].
The scale of the drug business
Novo Nordisk reported revenue of 309.1 billion kroner in 2025, operating income of 127.7 billion kroner and net income of 102.4 billion kroner, with total assets of 542.9 billion kroner and total equity of 194.0 billion kroner [1]. Net sales in 2024 were US$42.121 billion [1]. Its market capitalization exceeded the gross domestic product of Denmark in 2023, making it the highest valued company in Europe at that time [1].
Employment figures in the company's published profile differ: one section says Novo employs more than 48,000 people globally and markets products in 168 countries, while the 2025 figures list 68,794 employees [1].
Its product list includes Ozempic and Wegovy, both semaglutide, along with Saxenda and Victoza, and older diabetes and blood products such as Levemir, Tresiba, NovoRapid, Fiasp, Ryzodeg, Xultophy, Norditropin, NovoSeven, NovoEight and Activella [1].
In 2012, the business magazine Corporate Knights named Novo Nordisk the most sustainable company in the world, and ranked Novozymes fourth [1].
Why it matters for patients
The split itself has not been reported to change how any medicine is manufactured, prescribed, covered or priced, and no effect on the supply or cost of Ozempic or Wegovy has been disclosed [1]. What the separation does show is the shape of the company behind those prescriptions. Voting control of the drugmaker sits with a holding company owned by a foundation, not with a dispersed group of shareholders, so long-term decisions about research, production and pricing rest with a single owner [1].
That structure has been in place through the company's growth from an insulin maker founded on 1920s-era research into the largest pharmaceutical company in Denmark and a major supplier of diabetes and obesity medicines in 168 markets [1]. The spin-off of the enzymes business did not change that ownership arrangement as described [1].
Patients who take semaglutide products are affected mainly through supply and cost decisions made by a company of this size, and those decisions are not part of the reported separation [1].
What happens next
No milestones tied to the Novozymes separation, and no changes to the foundation's ownership stake in Novo Nordisk, have been reported [1]. The most recent figures available show Novo Holdings at roughly 28.1% of shares and 77.1% of votes, unchanged from the structure described [1].
Sources
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