Hanmi Pharm

Hanmi Pharmaceutical rests on four pillars: a domestic prescription drug business centered on in-house combination products, a Chinese subsidiary, an active pharmaceutical ingredient affiliate, and new drug R&D built on the LAPSCOVERY platform.

The domestic business hinges on prescription sales capability that has kept it first in outpatient prescription revenue for eight straight years since 2018, and Rosuzet, its dyslipidemia combination drug, recorded Q2 outpatient prescription sales of KRW 61.6bn, up 10.1% year on year, while the Amosartan hypertension family reached KRW 37.0bn and the Esomezol reflux family KRW 14.6bn.

Rather than relying solely on its own products, the company also expands in-licensed items through partnerships with global drugmakers such as Boehringer Ingelheim and Ferring Korea to build synergies with existing lines.

In China, Beijing Hanmi sells mainly pediatric and respiratory medicines, but Q2 revenue stayed at KRW 60.7bn and profit fell as volume-based procurement pressure coincided with the off-season.

API affiliate Hanmi Fine Chemical grew Q2 revenue 4.4% to KRW 24.0bn, with operating profit up 76.7% on higher API exports to Japan and new high-margin CDMO orders.

R&D spans roughly 30 pipelines across obesity and metabolic disease, rare disease and oncology, and the obesity franchise is bundled under the H.O.P project covering body composition, muscle preservation, dosing convenience and post-weight-loss maintenance, with six pipelines including efpeglenatide, HM15275, HM17321 and HM500197.

Their common foundation is LAPSCOVERY, a proprietary platform that extends the half-life of protein drugs and reduces dosing frequency. Competitively, the company faces leading domestic peers by prescription scale at home and multinationals dominating the GLP-1 class abroad.

The consolidation of US subsidiary Aptose adds oncology assets but also brings development costs into consolidated earnings.

Annual results show modest top-line growth alongside a clear margin improvement. Revenue rose from KRW 1,331.5bn in 2022 to KRW 1,490.9bn in 2023, KRW 1,495.5bn in 2024 and KRW 1,547.5bn in 2025, while operating profit moved from KRW 158.1bn to KRW 220.7bn, KRW 216.2bn and KRW 257.8bn over the same period.

The operating margin climbed from 11.9% in 2022 to 16.7% in 2025, a wider gain than the revenue expansion itself. Net profit attributable to owners grew from KRW 82.8bn in 2022 to KRW 169.6bn in 2025, and operating cash flow held steady at KRW 216.5bn in 2023, KRW 193.5bn in 2024 and KRW 173.1bn in 2025.

The balance sheet strengthened as the debt-to-equity ratio fell for four straight years, from 90.7% in 2022 to 72.6%, 62.9% and 50.2%.

On a quarterly basis, Q2 2025 delivered revenue of KRW 361.3bn and operating profit of KRW 60.4bn, followed by KRW 362.3bn and KRW 55.1bn in Q3, KRW 433.0bn and KRW 83.3bn in Q4, and KRW 392.9bn and KRW 53.6bn in Q1 2026, keeping margins in a 13-19% range.

Q2 2026 then jumped to revenue of KRW 467.2bn, operating profit of KRW 131.1bn and owners' net profit of KRW 83.3bn, lifting the margin to 28.1%; management cited growth in core products such as Rosuzet, expanded co-promotion sales and recognition of the sonepeglutide licensing upfront from Eli Lilly.

That upfront, USD 75mn or about KRW 112.9bn, is non-recurring, so the Q2 margin should not be read as a steady-state level.

On costs, R&D spending rose each year to KRW 205.0bn in 2023, KRW 209.8bn in 2024 and KRW 229.0bn in 2025, with KRW 125.5bn spent in the first half of 2026, up 18.2% year on year, meaning profit swings can widen in quarters without licensing income.

The global obesity drug market has been led by the GLP-1 class, but competition is shifting from how much weight is lost to the quality of that loss.

Muscle preservation and body composition have emerged as new battlegrounds, and attention is on whether non-incretin mechanisms can establish themselves as a new treatment option. Hanmi's Genentech deal, struck on a Phase 1 asset, fits that shift.

Across the Korean industry, out-licensing is in an expansion phase: domestic pharma and bio technology export deals totaled roughly USD 15bn last year, and disclosed deal value through August this year has already passed USD 11bn.

Most headline value, however, sits in milestones, so the timing and size of actual cash inflows depend on development progress.

In China, volume-based procurement is a structural drag, and brokerage analysis has cut Beijing Hanmi revenue estimates, citing uncertainty over when the policy impact ends and how it might improve.

Domestically, drug pricing reform is another variable, with one analysis noting that the pricing overhaul is set to be applied in stages from the second half, with price premiums and grace-period exceptions expected for innovative pharmaceutical companies that sustain R&D.

The net effect is a period in which slow domestic prescription growth, Chinese price pressure and global licensing all flow into results at once.

The nearest checkpoint is obesity drug efpeglenatide.

The company completed its marketing approval filing in December 2025 after being designated for the MFDS GIFT fast-track program in November, and said that a Phase 3 study in 448 obese adults showed an average 9.75% weight reduction at week 40, with reductions of up to 30% in some cases.

Management has laid out a pulled-forward launch target of the second half of 2026 and a mid-term strategy to build the drug into a blockbuster with over KRW 100bn in annual domestic sales.

That said, as of August 2026 no launch date has been officially confirmed, and the precise timing must be verified through the MFDS approval announcement. Indication expansion is under way, with a type 2 diabetes Phase 3 approved in January 2026, dosing started in April and completion planned for 2028.

On licensing, the company receives a USD 190mn upfront (about KRW 285.0bn) from Genentech, with total deal value including milestones of up to roughly USD 2.3bn plus separate royalties after launch, and Genentech takes over development from Phase 2 once Hanmi completes Phase 1.

For sonepeglutide, Hanmi will run the global Phase 2 in short bowel syndrome through completion, after which Lilly pursues follow-on development and commercialization.

On earnings, one brokerage noted that co-promotion product sales are rising each quarter and Hanmi Fine Chemical's shift toward CDMO is progressing smoothly, while a Beijing Hanmi recovery and Aptose development costs were flagged as unresolved issues.