Eli Lilly said clinical results of its GLP-1 in pill form showed safety and efficacy data similar to blockbuster injectable drugs.

A daily pill may be as effective in lowering blood sugar and aiding weight loss in people with Type 2 diabetes as the popular injectable drugs Mounjaro and Ozempic, according to results of a clinical trial announced by Eli Lilly on Thursday morning.

The drug, orforglipron, is a GLP-1, a class of drugs that have become blockbusters because of their weight-loss effects. But the GLP-1s on the market now are expensive, must be kept refrigerated and must be injected. A pill that produces similar results has the potential to become far more widely used, though it is also expected to be expensive.

Lilly said it would seek approval from the Food and Drug Administration later this year to market orforglipron for obesity and early in 2026 for diabetes. Industry analysts expect the drug to win approval sometime next year and to eventually become a major blockbuster. Eli Lilly is not expected to announce a price for the drug until after it wins approval.

“What we’re seeing start to play out is a fight for the future of the obesity market,” said Craig Garthwaite, a health care economist at Northwestern University.

The company announced a summary of its results on Thursday in a news release, as drug companies are required to do immediately after they receive study results that could affect their stock price.

But Lilly did not release the underlying data from its trial and the results it disclosed had not been examined by outside experts. The company said it would present detailed results at a meeting of diabetes researchers in June and would publish them in a peer-reviewed journal.