J.P. Morgan: China GLP-1 Market Update - Accelerating Growth Amid Intensifying Competition
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The Chinese GLP-1 market expanded significantly in 2025, easily exceeding 10 billion RMB in scale. However, competition is intensifying rapidly following Eli Lilly's aggressive price reduction for tirzepatide. By cutting the price roughly 80% to secure National Reimbursement Drug List (NRDL) inclusion, the monthly cost for the 2.5mg dose plummeted from 1,758 RMB to approximately 324 RMB. Novo Nordisk reported 6.8 billion DKK in 2025 Chinese semaglutide sales, growing only 9% at constant exchange rates, as Q4 sales declined 9.4% year-over-year due to inventory adjustments and competitive pressures.
Despite this fierce pricing environment, domestic firms are capturing substantial share. Innovent Biologics reported Q4 total product revenue around 3.3 billion RMB, up over 60% year-over-year. Its GLP-1 candidate, mazdutide, gained clear traction, generating an estimated 400-500 million RMB in Q4, a significant acceleration from the prior quarter. J.P.morgan maintains its peak sales forecast for mazdutide exceeding 5 billion RMB. The firm argues that prevailing market concerns are overblown, citing extremely low GLP-1 penetration rates in China, Innovent's extensive distribution channels, and mazdutide's differentiated efficacy as a dual GCG/GLP-1 receptor agonist. Furthermore, an anticipated 2027 NRDL inclusion should narrow the pricing gap with tirzepatide.