COPENHAGEN, Denmark — September 17, 2026
Orbis Medicines announced a strategic collaboration and license agreement with Novo Nordisk to discover and develop next-generation orally bioavailable macrocycle medicines for cardiometabolic diseases. Under the agreement, Orbis is eligible to receive up to $1.4 billion in upfront and potential development and commercial milestone payments, in addition to tiered royalties on future product sales. Novo will also make a strategic investment in Orbis Medicines, strengthening the relationship between the companies. The partnership combines Novo’s expertise in obesity and cardiometabolic disease with Orbis’ proprietary AI-enabled macrocycle discovery platform, targeting the development of oral medicines against therapeutic targets that have traditionally been addressed with injectable biologics.
Orbis nGen Platform Combines AI and Automated Chemistry
The collaboration will leverage Orbis Medicines’ proprietary nGen platform, which integrates generative artificial intelligence, high-throughput synthesis and screening to discover macrocycle candidates known as nCycles. The platform uses a multi-parameter optimization engine to design molecules with drug-like characteristics, including properties required for oral administration. Orbis is generating an expanding experimental macrocycle dataset through its automated laboratory workflow, allowing machine-learning models to continuously incorporate new chemical and biological data. The company said nGen can synthesize and analyze up to 100,000 distinct synthetic macrocycles within weeks, supporting rapid exploration of large chemical spaces. The approach is designed to address historical challenges surrounding the oral bioavailability and membrane permeability of macrocycles while expanding their potential application against difficult therapeutic targets.
Partnership Targets Oral Cardiometabolic Therapeutics
The Orbis-Novo collaboration is focused on discovering orally available macrocycle candidates for cardiometabolic targets, combining Orbis’ technology platform with Novo’s disease-area expertise. Orbis has initially concentrated its pipeline on targets validated by commercially successful biologic medicines that are administered by injection. The companies aim to use macrocycle chemistry to explore whether selected targets can be addressed through oral, fully synthetic medicines, potentially broadening treatment options and dosing approaches in obesity and other cardiometabolic diseases. For Orbis, the agreement also provides a development and commercialization pathway with an established pharmaceutical partner, while the strategic investment from Novo provides additional validation and support for the company’s nGen platform. The collaboration reflects growing industry interest in applying AI and automated chemistry to drug discovery while maintaining experimental data generation within the development cycle.
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Orbis Expands AI-Enabled Macrocycle Drug Discovery
The agreement marks a major business development milestone for Orbis Medicines as it advances its strategy to create orally bioavailable macrocycle therapeutics. The company has raised €116 million in venture funding to date, including a €90 million Series A led by NEA with participation from Lilly Ventures, Cormorant, EIFO, Forbion and Novo Holdings. Orbis operates from Copenhagen, Denmark, and Lausanne, Switzerland, and is building its nGen platform around large-scale chemical libraries, automated synthesis and machine-learning-driven optimization. Novo, meanwhile, brings substantial experience in obesity and cardiometabolic medicine to the partnership. With up to $1.4 billion in potential payments, tiered royalties and a strategic Novo investment, the collaboration gives Orbis an expanded platform for advancing oral macrocycle discovery while providing Novo access to an AI-enabled approach for developing new cardiometabolic medicines.
Source: Orbis Medicines press release
