On January 6th Thijs Hendrix founder of Hendrix Genetics in 2005 was inaugurated as a Member of the prestigious French Academy of Agriculture.  Hendrix is the third generation involved in poultry breeding as the son of Harry Hendrix who died in 2010 and Grandfather Thijs Hendrix (1884-1954) who established a breeding enterprise in 1923 in Ospel the Netherlands. Thijs Hendrix serves as the president of Hendrix Genetics and is still active in animal breeding and life sciences.

In 2005, the Institute de Selection Animale of France and Hendrix poultry breeders merged and the company was expanded in 2007 by acquisition of Euribrid, then owned by the Animal Breeding Division of Nutreco, a Dutch agricultural conglomerate.  Currently Hendrix Genetics has operations and joint ventures in 25 nations and supplies genetics to egg, turkey, aquaculture and pork industries in 100 nations.

The French Academy of Agriculture is a source of scientific, technical, legal, political and social information relating to agriculture and facilitates exchanges between scientists and the government of France.  The Academy dates back to 1761 established by royal decree and was formerly restructured by government charter in 1915.