Bagsværd, Denmark, 7 May 2019 - Novo Nordisk A/S has today entered into an agreement to purchase 7,012,500 B shares of DKK 0.20 to a value of DKK 2,235 million from Novo Holdings A/S. This transaction is part of Novo Nordisk A/S' 2019 share repurchase programme of up to a total of DKK 15 billion to be executed during a 12-month period beginning 1 February 2019. The transaction price is DKK 318.71 per share and has been calculated as the three-day volume weighted average market price from 3 May to 7 May 2019 in the open window following the announcement of Novo Nordisk A/S' quarterly financial results.

Prior to the sale of B shares, Novo Holdings A/S' ownership of Novo Nordisk A/S was 28.6% of the share capital and 76.3% of the votes. Following the transaction, Novo Holdings A/S owns 537,436,000 A shares of DKK 0.20 and 142,776,500 B shares of DKK 0.20, corresponding to 28.3% of the capital and 76.2% of the votes in Novo Nordisk A/S.

The transaction is in line with the announcement on 3 May 2019 that Novo Holdings A/S intends to maintain its ownership of Novo Nordisk A/S' share capital around 28%.

With the transaction stated above, Novo Nordisk A/S owns a total of 22,369,001 B shares of DKK 0.20, corresponding to 0.9% of the share capital, as treasury shares. The total amount of A and B shares in the company is 2,400,000,000 of DKK 0.20 including treasury shares.

About Novo Holdings A/S
Novo Holdings is a Danish private limited liability company wholly owned by the Novo Nordisk Foundation. It is the holding company of the Novo Group, comprising Novo Nordisk A/S and Novozymes A/S, and is responsible for managing the Foundation's assets.

In addition to being the major shareholder in the Novo Group companies, Novo Holdings provides seed and venture capital to development-stage companies, takes significant ownership positions in well-established companies within life science and manages a broad portfolio of financial assets.

It is the vision of Novo Holdings to be recognized as a world-leading life science investor with a focus on creating long-term value. Read more at www.novo-holdings.dk.

About Novo Nordisk A/S
Novo Nordisk is a global healthcare company with more than 95 years of innovation and leadership in diabetes care. This heritage has given us experience and capabilities that also enable us to help people defeat obesity, haemophilia, growth disorders and other serious chronic diseases. Headquartered in Denmark, Novo Nordisk employs approximately 43,200 people in 80 countries and markets its products in more than 170 countries. Novo Nordisk's B shares are listed on Nasdaq Copenhagen (Novo-B). Its ADRs are listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NVO). For more information, visit novonordisk.com, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube.

Further information

 Company announcement No 31/2019