Karl Khalil

Karl Khalil is co-founder and CEO of Divea, an EPFL spin-off in Sion that captures CO2 from industrial emissions. Divea was founded in 2024 out of the Laboratory of Advanced Separations led by Kumar Varoon Agrawal, who advises the company.

Its technology is a graphene membrane one atom thick, with pores the size of a CO2 molecule. Divea targets industries such as cement, steel, chemicals and aluminium and sees further uses in lithium extraction and battery metal recycling. It runs industrial demonstrators with Gaznat in Aigle and with the Tridel waste incinerator in Lausanne.

Under Khalil the company received Venture Kick funding in 2024, closed a pre-seed round with angel investors and was selected for the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award in 2026.