First month at 129,800 won, maintenance dose at 299,200 won

Early-entry and long-term cost relief backed by Pyeongtaek plant supply chain

Aggressive pricing set to reshape market dominated by foreign brands

Epe, South Korea's first domestically developed GLP-1 receptor agonist obesity treatment. [Hanmi Pharm]
Epe, South Korea's first domestically developed GLP-1 receptor agonist obesity treatment. [Hanmi Pharm]

South Korea's first homegrown GLP-1 obesity drug has entered the domestic market with an aggressive pricing strategy, taking aim at a segment long dominated by global pharmaceutical giants including Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Eli Lilly's Mounjaro.

Hanmi Pharm has set the initial treatment cost for its newly approved drug Epe — generic name efpeglenatide — at roughly half the price of competing foreign therapies, a move expected to shake up the domestic obesity drug market, estimated to be worth around 2 trillion won ($1.49 billion).

Industry sources said Thursday that Hanmi Pharm recently finalized the wholesale and retail prices for Epe auto-injector pens across all dosage levels. Including value-added tax, patients will pay 129,800 won in the first month, 228,800 won in the second month and 277,200 won in the third month. From the fourth month onward, the maintenance dose is priced at 299,200 won per month.

Under the dosing structure, patients in the initial adaptation phase use two pens each of the 2 mg and 4 mg doses in the first month. A box of two 2 mg pens is priced at 48,400 won, while a box of two 4 mg pens costs 81,400 won, bringing the combined first-month cost to 129,800 won. From the 6 mg dose onward — when patients enter the full titration phase — each box contains four pens. The 6 mg box is priced at 228,800 won, the 8 mg box at 277,200 won, and the maximum 10 mg dose at 299,200 won.

Epe's core competitive advantage is its significantly lower cost compared with treatments from global pharmaceutical majors. Its initial treatment cost is 37 percent lower than Wegovy and 53 percent lower than Mounjaro. Even at the maintenance stage, where continued dosing is essential, Epe is reportedly 17 percent and 19 percent cheaper than the two foreign products, respectively. However, the final price patients pay may vary depending on wholesale distribution margins and the pricing policies of individual clinics and pharmacies.

The pricing is designed to reduce the financial barrier for patients entering treatment — many of whom previously dropped out due to the high out-of-pocket costs of uninsured drugs — while also easing the long-term economic burden that comes with the extended dosing obesity treatment requires.

The domestic GLP-1 market has until now relied entirely on imported drugs. The high cost of uninsured treatment, often running to hundreds of thousands of won per month from the outset, has placed a heavy financial burden on patients and fueled distorted distribution practices — including deep discounting at certain clinics and illegal dose-splitting. A persistent problem has been patients discontinuing treatment after just one or two months due to cost, leading to weight regain and high dropout rates.

Hanmi Pharm's strategy is to lower the initial price barrier to the low 100,000-won range to attract new patients, while reducing the financial burden of long-term maintenance dosing to improve treatment adherence.

On the clinical side, Epe incorporates the company's proprietary formulation technology, Lapscovery, designed to maintain stable drug concentrations in the bloodstream. A gradual dose-escalation schedule at two- and four-week intervals has also been introduced to reduce gastrointestinal side effects such as nausea and vomiting — the leading cause of dropout among existing GLP-1 therapies.

Supply stability is another key differentiator over imported drugs. Global pharmaceutical companies have struggled to maintain consistent supply volumes in South Korea amid surging worldwide demand, causing disruptions at medical facilities. Epe, by contrast, is manufactured entirely at Hanmi Pharm's bio plant in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province, from raw materials through to finished product. The fully domestic supply chain lets the company maintain stable inventory at all times, free from dependence on overseas imports.

Industry observers say Epe's arrival could mark a turning point for the domestic obesity treatment landscape, which has been locked into a high-cost, import-dependent model. The combination of competitive pricing and a stable domestic production network directly challenges the dominance of multinational pharmaceutical companies and advances South Korea's biopharmaceutical sovereignty.

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety approved Epe on Oct. 8 as South Korea's 45th new drug, covering all five dosage strengths — 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 mg — developed independently by Hanmi Pharm. With the domestically made obesity treatment set to go on sale before year's end at a notably competitive price, attention is now turning to how quickly it can carve into a market that global blockbusters have long held.


silverpaper@heraldcorp.com