Where does the money come from? One might conflate these philanthropic efforts by the Novo Nordisk Foundation to mean the foundation is by nature a charity owned by Novo Nordisk. Instead, Novo Holdings is a Danish private limited liability company and the controlling shareholder of Novo Nordisk. Novo Holdings is wholly owned by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, which is self-governing. In simpler terms, this means the financial success of Novo Nordisk's range of drugs for obesity, diabetes, haemophilia, growth disorder and hormone replacement therapy, in turn provide the Novo Nordisk Foundation with the capital they use to set up its initiatives.