- Business
- Sumitomo Pharma Co., Ltd. (SMDPY) develops, manufactures and markets innovative pharmaceuticals and healthcare solutions with a focus on psychiatry and neurology, oncology, regenerative medicine and cell therapy, and other therapeutic areas including diabetes and rare diseases. The company offers prescription drugs such as those for Parkinson's disease, schizophrenia, type 2 diabetes including Ozempic through co-promotion, obesity treatments including Wegovy through recent co-promotion agreements, and iPS cell-derived therapies for conditions like Parkinson's disease; it also provides animal health products, food ingredients and chemical materials. Sumitomo Pharma operates primarily in Japan and the United States, with additional presence in Asia and global research collaborations, from its headquarters in Osaka, Japan, where it was founded in 1897.
In recent developments, Sumitomo Pharma entered a co-promotion agreement with Novo Nordisk Pharma in October 2025 for Wegovy, a GLP-1 receptor agonist for obesity treatment in Japan, building on their July 2025 co-promotion of Ozempic for type 2 diabetes; co-promotion activities for Wegovy commence in November 2025. The company sold its pharmaceutical sales business in Asia to Marubeni Corporation in a transaction completed around April 2025, involving a new entity where Marubeni holds a 60% stake valued at approximately 45 billion yen, with an option for the remainder post-2029. In November 2025, Sumitomo Pharma offloaded subsidiaries Sumitomo Pharma (China) Co., Ltd. and Sumitomo Pharma Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd. to Marubeni Global Pharma as part of ongoing restructuring efforts.