WeightWatchers Flounders in the Ozempic Era
WW announced on Thursday that it will be laying off employees and cutting costs to the tune of $100 million per year.
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WeightWatchers has been around 10 times longer than Ozempic, but seniority isn’t everything.
The company, now also known as WW, announced on Thursday that it will be laying off employees and cutting costs to the tune of $100 million per year.
It’s Not Over ‘Til Everyone Medicates
WW suffered something of an existential crisis with the advent of semaglutide drugs: diabetes-turned-weight-loss drugs like Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro. Weight-loss drugs have experienced skyrocketing demand, which has in turn shaken the trunks of sectors that rely on our peckishness.
WW tried to ride the semaglutide wave, but hasn’t found much success:
- In March 2023, WW bought telehealth startup Sequence, which sells weight-loss drugs including Wegovy directly to consumers.
- In October, WW hired a new chief medical officer, Amy Meister, to run the medical intervention side of its business. Meister stepped down last week after just nine months on the job, sources told Bloomberg.
Wonderdrugs: The benefits of drugs like Wegovy and Mounjaro just keep coming, it seems. Earlier this week, a study found an older drug made by Novo Nordisk may slow the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Meanwhile, Eli Lilly announced that tirzepatide — the drug inside its weight-loss medication Zepbound, also sold under the name Mounjaro to treat diabetes — offered numerous benefits to heart-failure patients. Beating a whole host of diseases is kind of a tall order for WW.