Judge Rejects Novo’s Bid to Halt Lilly Ads After Assessing Market Impact
Key Facts
A federal judge rejected Novo Nordisk’s request for a preliminary injunction to halt Eli Lilly’s advertisements for Zepbound and Mounjaro, finding that the company had not shown the ads threatened its sales, undermined its business reputation or caused lasting damage to its clinical reputation. The ads may therefore continue while the lawsuit proceeds, and the decision does not rule on the underlying allegation about their accuracy or whether they are misleading. The judge said Novo had failed to demonstrate the harm needed to justify this exceptional measure. The decision followed a two-day hearing in late August. Novo said the litigation remains ongoing and the question of whether the ads are misleading has not been resolved.
The lawsuit concerns ads for Zepbound, which is indicated for obesity treatment, and Mounjaro, which is indicated for diabetes treatment, according to Novo’s description in the suit it filed in July. The company says the ads compared higher doses of Lilly’s two drugs with lower doses of its own Wegovy and Ozempic. In one ad, Zepbound users were said to have lost an average of 50 pounds, or 23 kilograms, compared with 33 pounds, or 15 kilograms, for Wegovy users. The comparison is based on the dosage and outcome figures presented in the ads, which are central to Novo’s objection to how the competing products were portrayed. But the refusal to halt the ads does not determine whether the comparison is misleading; that question remains part of the legal dispute.
In assessing the commercial impact, Reuters reported that the ads had, at most, only a slight effect on the market between April and July 2026, while prescriptions for Novo’s products remained stable. The judge cited the lack of evidence that sales were threatened or reputation was harmed, and said monetary damages could compensate the company for any non-trivial harm it might suffer without an injunction. The judge also found Novo’s claim of irreparable harm insufficient to justify urgent intervention. The company’s arguments were not persuasive enough on a very preliminary record, the judge concluded, while emphasizing that the merits of the lawsuit had not been decided. The current ruling therefore only denies a temporary injunction, while proceedings continue to consider the underlying allegations.
Novo announced on July 21, 2026, that it had filed a federal lawsuit against Eli Lilly and Lilly USA over Zepbound and Mounjaro ads, seeking a permanent injunction and a corrective advertising campaign. The dispute comes in a market where the two companies compete in obesity and diabetes treatments, with Lilly’s products posting strong growth in the second quarter of 2026. The company’s revenue rose 48% to $23.0 billion, and it said growth was driven by sales volume for Mounjaro and Zepbound. Global Mounjaro revenue was $9.9 billion, up 91%, while U.S. Zepbound revenue reached $4.9 billion, up 44%. The results show the commercial weight of the two products featured in the disputed ads.
Novo’s figures likewise reflect the scale of activity in the sector: combined sales of its obesity drugs and Ozempic were about $32 billion in 2025, according to court filings. Reuters forecast that the U.S. market for injectable obesity drugs would exceed $100 billion by the end of the decade. In July, Novo said its 7.2 mg Wegovy dose, approved since March 2026, showed an average weight reduction of 19%, or about 47 pounds. The company also raised its 2026 adjusted sales growth forecast to a range of 0% to -6% at constant exchange rates, attributing the revision to higher estimates for sales of GLP-1 products. These figures provide commercial context for the dispute without resolving the question before the court about the accuracy of the ads.
In trading, Eli Lilly shares closed at $1279.14 and Novo Nordisk shares at $39.13 on October 26, 2026. These prices do not link the ruling to movements in either stock; they are simply the companies’ closing prices on that date. Novo is due to report results for the first nine months of 2026 on November 4. The company previously said weekly prescriptions for Wegovy pills exceeded 265,000 in the week ended July 17, and that it plans to launch the pills in additional selected markets over the coming quarters. Meanwhile, the request to halt the ads remains denied as the lawsuit proceeds, with no court ruling on the allegation that the ads are misleading.