Meet the Mastermind Behind the Epic Overthrow of Europe’s Biggest Corporation – Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen Reveals All!

Soon after taking over as chief executive officer of Novo Nordisk in 2017, Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen made a decision this month that would make the Danish pharmaceutical maker the largest European company by market capitalization.

The drug company had yet to launch Ozempic, the diabetes drug that would later rise to fame when celebrities pulled it off the weight-loss label, and Wegovy, the diabetes-fighting version, was years away from being approved. obesity. The executive team was debating whether to undertake an expensive study that would show whether or not Wegovy would reduce the risk of heart attacks and strokes.

Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, managing director of the Novo Nordisk Foundation, which holds the majority of voting rights in the company, described the executives as asking: “Why would we do such a process with a high risk of showing nothing? Perhaps it is precisely the antidiabetic effect responsible for the benefits seen in diabetes. What if we see nothing about obesity and it costs hundreds of millions of dollars to experiment with?”

But in the end it was Jørgensen’s turn. “His head was on the block. That’s a lot of money,” she said.

His gamble paid off: The first study data released last month showed that patients who had taken the drug Wegovy had a 20% lower probability. of suffering a cardiovascular event such as a heart attack or stroke compared to those who received a placebo.

Investors are hoping the data will show health care systems and insurers that the drug, which has made headlines as a weight-loss tool for the wealthy, could actually save lives and save costs. The stock soared 16% that day and continued to rise through 1970 Novo Nordisk It overtook French luxury conglomerate LVMH on Monday to become Europe’s largest company.

Jørgensen has a huge business opportunity: Novo Nordisk is one of two leading companies, along with Eli Lilly, in a market that Canadian investment bank BMO estimates could be worth up to $130-140 billion a year. year at its peak.

But it also faces enormous challenges: The company is still trying to increase supply of the drug to some health insurers they are reluctant to pay the billand Ozempic and Wegovy are used as weight loss doses by people who are anything but obese.

Jørgensen learned to take responsibility at a young age on the family farm in Jutland, Denmark.

Lars Green, CFO of the Novozymes subsidiary, has known Jørgensen since his university days.

“His upbringing made him realize that things don’t come by themselves. They require investment, or effort, and based on those efforts, profits are made,” he said.

After studying finance and economics, Jørgensen joined Novo Nordisk in the graduate program in 1991 and worked with the company in the US, Japan and the Netherlands, in functions ranging from technology to business development.

Jesper Brandgaard, former chief financial officer of Novo Nordisk, describes Jørgensen when he became interim head of corporate finance at the company, aged just 33. responsibility, whether it’s feeding the pigs or whatever he needs to do,” he said.

Jørgensen, 56, met his wife in Novo Nordisk and they now have two grown children. In addition to responsibility, he emphasizes the importance of reflection in life, kayaking on the lake near his home.

Novo Nordisk – along with the rest of the Danish pharmaceutical industry – has grown so much that without it the Scandinavian country’s economy would be in a recession. Thanks to it, Denmark’s gross domestic product grew by 1.7% in the first half of this year. Excluding, it contracted by 0.3%.

But the company, which turned 100 this year, is far from a household name, and Jørgensen doesn’t want to become a “brand,” like other Big Pharma CEOs. Often described by his friends as a humble introvert who listens intently, he’s eager to share the stage with his crew.

Barclays analyst Emily Field said she doesn’t dominate her earnings forecasts like some better-known pharma leaders. “He hasn’t become the face of the company and people really like that. This is about Novo Nordisk, not him,” she said.

But one person familiar with the matter said that while he liked the idea of ​​the organization being flat, he had a veto over everything. “At first you think he doesn’t have much gravitas, but after half an hour in a room with him you see he’s very calm, very level-headed, never gets angry. He can control the room by lifting his head very quickly,” he said.

Long before its obesity drugs hit the headlines, Novo Nordisk was under political pressure in the United States to raise insulin prices. The company was recently suspended by the UK industry association for mismarketing a previous obesity drug. Jørgensen apologized and said the failure to disclose sponsorship of a training course was a “mistake”.

Now Jørgensen faces internal scrutiny in Denmark, where Novo Nordisk is the largest taxpayer, and is chairman of the European industry lobby group, which is campaigning against the biggest EU reform in pharmaceutical legislation in 20 years .

Jørgensen recently met for lunch with one of his critics in the Danish parliament, Socialist People’s Party MP Lisbeth Bech-Nielsen. She argued that now that the company has a market cap and earnings that are “out of this world,” she should consider lowering prices. “Obviously we didn’t agree, but I got a good impression of him,” she said.

Nathalie Moll, director general of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, believes that Novo Nordisk is an example of European innovation. You said that Jørgensen was the right person to lead the industry group because he knew how to make Europe better for a company “that is growing, not a company that has already grown, or a small company, but one that has really evolved over the last 30 years”. years”.

Additional reports by Euan Healy and Richard Milne