As the Super Bowl approached halftime, Hims & Hers publicly staked its claim to preventive medicine in front of the American people. In a one-minute ad, the direct-to-consumer health company highlighted how America’s wealth gap has translated into a health gap, ostensibly fueled by inequitable access to peptides, drugs, and concierge care. Through the ad, narrated by rapper and activist Common, Hims pitched its services, like tailored prescriptions, supplement packs, and themed lab panels, as solutions to members of the middle class: a dad waiting for his son in a school pick-up line, a woman running stadium steps for exercise. The energy of the Hims universe seemed to be less “eat the rich,” and more “you too can be rich,” similar to Klarna and Robinhood.
Not everyone, however, was happy. When Hims also announced that it would be selling compounded oral semaglutide, the Food and Drug Administration quickly asked the Department of Justice to launch an investigation into the company. Novo Nordisk, the developers of semaglutide, subsequently sued Hims for patent infringement. Just hours later, Hims pulled its oral compounded GLP-1 offering from its website.
The legal imbroglio between Hims and Novo Nordisk, which the two companies settled Monday, has been framed in multiple ways: as a story about complex drug pricing dynamics in the pharmaceutical industry, as a public health issue, and even as an act of social justice.
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