Lawsuits don’t often end in partnerships.
And yet that is the strange but true tale involving Hims & Hers and drug manufacturer Novo Nordisk. Last month, Novo Nordisk sued Hims & Hers over its sale and marketing of compounded GLP-1s. But a month later, the companies kissed and made up. On Monday, they announced that the two firms were launching a collaboration and Novo Nordisk dropped its lawsuit against Hims & Hers. Why? Because apparently “they need each other.”
“[Novo Nordisk] needs more customers, faster, and Hims needs to be out of the compounding game, at least on this product, and needs to find another way to make money,” said Michael Abrams, managing partner of Numerof & Associates, a consulting firm.
Through the new collaboration, Hims & Hers will offer Novo’s Ozempic injections and Wegovy pills and injections on its platform. In October, Hims & Hers reported that more than 418,000 customers accessed a GLP-1 medication through its platform. Compounded GLP-1s — which have the same active ingredient found in branded GLP-1s but are not FDA-approved — will now only be provided on a “limited scale.” This means the compounded versions will only be prescribed to customers whose clinical needs cannot be met by FDA-approved GLP-1s and when a provider determines the compounded version is clinically appropriate.
In addition, Hims & Hers will no longer advertise compounded GLP-1s on its platform or in its marketing.
“The weight loss landscape is completely different today than it was when we first entered the category,” said Andrew Dudum, co-founder and CEO of Hims & Hers, in a post on X. “FDA-approved GLP-1 treatments are now more accessible, with greater affordability and more flexible dosing options and form factors. These market changes are shifting consumer demand towards these branded medications.”
According to a Novo Nordisk spokesperson, the agreement is a win for patients and positions the companies for success.
“Hims & Hers made an enterprise decision to shift their business model to FDA-approved GLP-1s,” said Liz Skrbkova of Novo Nordisk in an email. “We welcome this shift in their business model towards affordable FDA-approved medicines.”
The history
The conflict between Hims & Hers and Novo Nordisk can be traced back to the 2025 Super Bowl, when Hims & Hers released a commercial declaring that the American healthcare system was built to keep patients “sick and stuck.” It also stated that there are medications that work, but are priced “for profits, not patients.” It didn’t specifically name any drugs, but did feature its compounded GLP-1s.
In response to this commercial, Novo Nordisk put out a print ad in the New York Times and USA Today stating, “Do you really know what you’re injecting into your body?” It then states that compounded GLP-1s are not FDA-approved and are not proven safe or effective.
At the time of the Super Bowl ad, there was a shortage of semaglutide injectables. Compounded drugs can only be prescribed when there is a shortage of an FDA-approved drug, or if a patient cannot be treated with an FDA-approved medication. The FDA announced in February 2025, shortly after the Super Bowl, that the shortage had been resolved.
Then in April 2025, Novo Nordisk launched a partnership with Hims & Hers, along with several other telehealth companies, that provided access to its direct-to-consumer delivery option NovoCare Pharmacy through Hims & Hers for Wegovy. However, this partnership was short-lived: Novo Nordisk dropped the collaboration just a couple of months later due to Hims & Hers’ continued mass sales of compounded GLP-1s.
Just in January, Novo Nordisk released the oral Wegovy pill, with Hims & Hers following up by offering a compounded version of this pill in February. However, Hims & Hers pulled this offering a few days later after the FDA announced that it planned to take legal action to safeguard consumers from drugs the FDA doesn’t regulate. Then in February, Novo Nordisk also filed a lawsuit against Hims & Hers for its sale and marketing of compounded GLP-1s, which it has now dropped.
Why they reconciled
Hims & Hers and Novo Nordisk ultimately stopped feuding because of pure business necessity. Due to the legal threats from the FDA and Novo Nordisk, Hims & Hers needed to get out of the compounding business and find another way to make revenue, especially following its announcement that it’s acquiring Australian digital health company Eucalyptus, said Abrams of Numerof. This deal with Novo provides continuity to its current customers, and supports the new customer base it is acquiring from Eucalyptus, many of whom may be interested in branded GLP-1s.
Novo Nordisk, meanwhile, is facing increasing competition from Eli Lilly and needs to reach more patients.
“Novo is currently in the lead, but Lilly is expected to catch up and surpass Novo in the next few years,” Abrams said. “So getting patients started on their drug now is the surest way to capture ongoing market share. Novo doing a distribution agreement that compensates Hims in some fashion for providing access to their customer base gets them what they want, which is more customers now. The sooner they get them, the more they get, the more likely it is that they will keep those customers for some period of time.”
Another healthcare expert noted that this collaboration is a “vital lifeline” for Hims & Hers. After the FDA’s crackdown on compounded GLP-1s, the telehealth company faced a “valuation gap,” according to Warren Templeton, managing director at Health2047, a venture studio for the American Medical Association. Much of its recent stock momentum had been driven by the high margins of compounded semaglutide (its stock spiked 24% after its Super Bowl ad), a business that became increasingly vulnerable as shortages eased and regulators stepped up enforcement. The new distribution framework with Novo (assuming it’s global) also adds value to the Eucalyptus acquisition as Hims faces compounding restrictions internationally, Templeton added.
But this is also a major win for Novo.
“By settling its lawsuit and establishing a distribution agreement for Wegovy, Novo Nordisk is transforming a former adversary into a high-scale digital channel, effectively neutralizing the threat of compounded GLP-1s at scale,” he stated. “While Eli Lilly has found success with its owned LillyDirect platform, Novo continues to lean heavily on third-party partners like Weight Watchers, Ro, and now Hims & Hers.”
While this chapter is closed, it’s worth noting that there are several other active lawsuits filed by Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly over compounded GLP-1s, including against compounding pharmacies like Axtell’s Rite-Value Pharmacy and Link Pharmacy. Some non-pharmacy lawsuits are against telehealth companies like Mochi Health and Fella Health, as well as medspas like Prism Aesthetics.
While the deal with Hims has naturally no legal bearing on those cases, it does highlight a possible path to resolving conflicts between manufacturers and compounders/distributors.
“Striking a distribution agreement between the manufacturer and the compounder/distributor in which the latter drops the compounded version in favor of the approved product and the manufacturer gains access to a new segment of consumers can potentially satisfy both parties,” Abrams said. “This, however, does not help compounders in the mass production business, who are likely to see new legal boundaries evolve from the resolution of pending lawsuits.”
Photo: fizkes, Getty Images
