Eckard joined Domain in 2001 as a partner and became an advisory partner in January 2020. He specializes in creating companies around promising new pharmaceutical products and has led Domain’s Japanese in-licensing initiatives.

Eckard is a board member of Exalys Therapeutics and CEO and a board member of Transposon Therapeutics.

He has been founding CEO of multiple biopharmaceutical companies in the Domain portfolio including Acea Pharmaceuticals, Adastra Pharmaceuticals, Ascenta Therapeutics, Calixa Therapeutics, Cytovia, Domain Anti Bacterial Acquisition Corporation, NovaCardia, Novacea, Novalar Pharmaceuticals, Ocera Therapeutics, Orexigen Therapeutics, Sonexa Therapeutics, Syndax Pharmaceuticals, Tobira Therapeutics and Transposon Therapeutics.

Eckard was chairman of a number of companies until their successful exits including Peninsula Pharmaceuticals (sold to Johnson & Johnson, 2005), Cerexa (sold to Forest Laboratories, 2007), NovaCardia (sold to Merck, 2007), Calixa (sold to Cubist Pharmaceuticals, 2009) and Ocera Therapeutics (sold to Mallinckrodt, 2017). He was also a board member of Conforma Therapeutics (sold to Biogen-IDEC, 2006), Cabrellis Pharmaceuticals (sold to Pharmion, 2006) and Tobira Therapeutics (sold to Allergan, 2016).

Previously, Eckard was a tenured professor of pharmacology at the University of California at Irvine. He has more than 30 years of drug discovery and development experience and has been a consultant to biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. He is the inventor or co-inventor of numerous patents and patent applications, and he has published more than 130 papers in scientific periodicals.

Eckard completed his Abitur from Kolping Kolleg, Friedrichshafen, Germany and his M.D. from the University of Ulm Medical School, Germany. He received his postdoctoral training in neuroscience at Stanford University Medical School.