What will be the next big hype after obesity? – An expert panel highlighted their top picks
In recent years, companies developing drugs in the field of obesity have enjoyed increasing growth. Last year, Denmark’s Novo Nordisk, developer of the appetite suppressant Wegovy (semaglutide), was valued higher than Denmark’s entire GDP.
“Innovation sometimes moves much slower than we expect it to,” said Duarte Marchand, Head of Sweden and the Nordics at Johnson & Johnson, during a panel discussion at The Future of Swedish & Danish Life Science event. According to Marchand, obesity drugs were discussed as the next big thing as early as 2006, when he started his career in life science.
During the panel discussion, Duarte Marchand and Jonathan Ilicki, Principal at Industrifonden, and Sanne Brun Jensen, Senior Associate at Bioinnovation Institute, predicted what they believe has the potential to be just as big in the future.
Duarte Marchand highlighted Crispr-Cas9 as one of the interesting fields.
“It is maturing. Where will it take us? I have no idea, but it will be worth keeping an eye on.”
Crispr-Cas9, also known as genetic scissors, is a genome editing tool that can be used to make changes to the genome. In 2020, the Nobel Prize was awarded to former Umeå researcher Emmanuelle Charpentier, together with Jennifer Doudna, for discovering the molecular tool.
For Duarte Marchand and Sanne Brun Jensen, the field of degenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, is also an interesting area with a lot going on right now.
“Another and much broader field that I am very excited about is women’s health. I believe we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg right now,” said Sanne Brun Jensen.
Jonathan Ilicki from Industrifonden highlighted entirely different areas with great potential: AI in healthcare and omics.
“There are a number of interesting developments in omics, both hardware and software tools, that give us new insights when developing new therapies. The future looks bright,” he said.
Artikeln är en del av vårt tema om News in English.