The first approved drug for nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), a potentially fatal liver disease that affects at least 5 million people in the United States alone, should arrive in 2019. By March’s end, Intercept Pharmaceuticals will release phase 3 trial data for its NASH drug, with a regulatory filing likely to quickly follow. Genfit, based in Lille, France, and Allergan, based in Dublin, are close behind. These companies are competing for a huge market opportunity.“You can get a very large sales numbers when you have that many patients,” says Alan Carr, a biotech analyst for Needham, who says it’s too early to put a dollar value on the potential market:“It will be one of the larger indications, in terms of sales, in healthcare.” NASH is an epidemic. The disease, long thought unimportant by the medical community, is set to overtake hepatitis C as the largest single cause of liver transplantation. NASH afflicts 2–5% of