Viking's Two Phase 3 Trials of Injectable VK2735 Finish Enrolling; Tablet Version Aims for Phase 3 in Late 2026

What happened

VK2735 acts on the GLP-1 and GIP receptors, the same pair of targets as tirzepatide.

The larger study, VANQUISH-1, closed enrollment in November 2025 with more than 4,500 adults who have obesity or are overweight. The company said it passed its original recruitment goal ahead of schedule. Participants are randomly assigned to weekly injections of 7.5 mg, 12.5 mg or 17.5 mg, or to placebo, and neither they nor their study doctors know which. Treatment runs 78 weeks, and the main question is how much body weight changes from the starting point by that week.

VANQUISH-2 uses the same design in roughly 1,000 adults who have type 2 diabetes along with obesity or overweight, plus a one-year extension phase. Viking said that trial completed enrollment during the first quarter of 2026.

Two other pieces of the program moved as well. After an end-of-Phase-2 meeting with the FDA in December 2025, Viking said it expects to begin Phase 3 testing of the tablet form of VK2735 in the fourth quarter of 2026. Separately, a maintenance-dosing study that opened in October 2025 and filled its roughly 180 slots by January 2026 is comparing weekly, every-other-week and monthly injections after an initial build-up period. The company expects those results in the third quarter of 2026. Viking also said it had filed an application to begin human testing of VK3019, an amylin candidate, with a Phase 1 start planned for the second quarter of 2026.

On the financial side, the company reported $603 million in cash and short-term investments as of March 31, 2026, down from $706 million at the end of 2025, with a first-quarter net loss of $158.3 million and research spending of $150.2 million, up from $41.4 million a year earlier.

What it means

For patients, this is a timing signal rather than a result. Both Phase 3 trials run 78 weeks, so the earliest meaningful readouts on how well the injection works arrive long after this announcement, with any regulatory filing later still. Nothing here changes what is available at the pharmacy today, and nothing here tells you whether VK2735 will work better or worse than the drugs already approved.

The maintenance study is the piece worth watching soonest. Very few obesity trials have asked whether people can hold their results on less frequent dosing. If stretching to every other week or to monthly turns out to hold up, that would matter for cost, for injection burden, and for people who find a weekly routine hard to sustain. Those data are due before either Phase 3 trial reads out.

What it does not mean

Completing enrollment is an operational milestone. It says a company recruited enough people, not that the drug helped them. VK2735 is not approved by any regulator in either form, and there is no legitimate way to obtain it outside a clinical trial. The mid-stage tablet figures the company has cited, including weight reductions of up to 12.2 percent from baseline after 13 weeks, come from a short study reported by the manufacturer, with no head-to-head comparison against approved medicines. All of the above comes from a corporate earnings release, which is an industry communication rather than peer-reviewed evidence or an independent review.