# Irene Hofman

> Irene Hofman is a seed investor at IDB Lab backing Payments and Security. See 3 investments, check sizes, portfolio and contact details. Updated Oct 2026.

- Type: Angel Investor
- Fund: [IDB Lab](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/idb-lab)
- Location: Washington, United States
- Total investments: 3
- Last investment: Apr 2023
- Lead investor: 67%
- Last updated: Oct 2026
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iarias
- X (Twitter): https://twitter.com/iariashofman?lang=en

Irene Hofman is a seed investor at IDB Lab in Washington focused on Payments and Security. She has over 2 decades of experience investing in emerging markets and leading teams in all continents.

## Contacts

5 contacts available for Irene Hofman: work email, personal email, work phone, personal phone and socials. Sign up free to unlock them: https://app.shizune.co/sign-up/investor-profiles/find-email/irene-hofman?utm_source=investor_profile

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Payments | 1 | 33% |
| Security | 1 | 33% |
| Software | 1 | 33% |
| Biometrics | 1 | 33% |
| Mobile Apps | 1 | 33% |

14 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Seed | 1 | 33% |
| Series B | 1 | 33% |
| Series C | 1 | 33% |

### Country

| Country | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Uruguay | 1 | 33% |
| Argentina | 1 | 33% |
| El Salvador | 1 | 33% |

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cubo | Cubo is a developer of a payment services platform. They offer small and medium businesses, starting with the point-of-sale systems that make payment accessible for merchants. | $3.5M | Seed | Apr 21, 2023 | https://www.cubopago.com |
| VU | Sebastián Stranieri, is CEO and founder of VU Inc, a multinational company that provides secure and frictionless digital experiences for more than 350 million people over the world. Passionate about technology, he has more than two decades of experience in the cybersecurity industry. His career has always been driven by the desire to innovate insafer solutions that improve the quality of life of citizens and companies, and that is how VU was born. VU focuses on the new concept of “online persona” providing robust identity verification for its users, which allows a more holistic authentication paradigm. Through the combination of traditional cybersecurity controls with geolocation, biometrics and user behavior analysis based on machine learning, VU enables a continuous authentication process where the user is seen as a whole, rather than a set of credentials. In July 2021, VU announced a $12 million Series B funding round with investors such as Globant and Telefonica. Sebastian, is also an Endeavor entrepreneur, he was recognized by MIT Technology Review magazine in 2013 and selected by Forbes Argentina as one of the 30 Promises in 2017. His passion for what he does led him to win the Sadosky Award for Entrepreneur of the Year for the Chamber of the Argentine Software Industry (CESSI) in 2019. VU received several recognitions, such as: Cybersecurity Ventures ranking 500, Santander’s X100 and VISA - La Nación’s Innovation Award, in the category of payment methods and cybersecurity for developing new business models in financial services through the use of technology that mark socioeconomic trends, changes in consumption habits and payment methods and also improve the security of transactions, among many acknowledgments from Microsoft as partners and for our technology, such as: AI Latam Partner of the Year (2021), Global Finalists in IA and Government (2021) and Country Partner of the Year (Argentina, 2019 and Bolivia, 2020) | $12M | Series B | Jul 12, 2021 | http://www.vusecurity.com |
| Scanntech | Scanntech is a data intelligence technology firm that provides point-of-sale software to retail stores. |  | Series C | Jun 10, 2014 | https://scanntech.com.br |

3 of 3 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [Agrega Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/agrega-partners) — VC Fund, 1 deal together
- [Amador Holdings](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/amador-holdings) — VC Fund, 1 deal together
- [ArFintech](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/arfintech) — VC Fund, 1 deal together
- [Bridge One](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/bridge-one) — VC Fund, 1 deal together
- [Endeavor Catalyst](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/endeavor-catalyst) — VC Fund, 1 deal together
- [Globant](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/globant) — VC Fund, 1 deal together

## About IDB Lab

VC Fund · Washington, United States

IDB Lab is the innovation laboratory of the Inter-American Development Bank Group (IDB) Group.

3 contacts available at IDB Lab.

| Name | Title | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Mara Balestrini | Digital Transformation and Experimentation Senior Consultant | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/mara-balestrini |
| Irene Hofman | CEO | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/irene-hofman |
| Magdalena Coronel | Chief investment officer | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/magdalena-coronel-2288 |

## Similar investors

### Similar stage
- [Antler](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/antler-be9c) — VC Fund
- [Right Side Capital Management](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/right-side-capital-management) — VC Fund
- [Alumni Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alumni-ventures-group) — VC Fund

## FAQ

### What does Irene Hofman invest in?

Irene Hofman invests primarily in Payments, Security and Software startups, most often at Seed and Series B stage. Most of the 3 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in Uruguay. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### How do I contact Irene Hofman?

Public channels for Irene Hofman include LinkedIn and X (Twitter). For a verified work email and phone number, create a free Shizune account — contact data is searched across 20+ sources and validated before delivery, so your outreach lands in the right inbox.

### When did Irene Hofman last invest?

The most recent investment recorded for Irene Hofman closed in Apr 2023. Shizune tracks 3 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Oct 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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