The Westport-based payroll technology firm Payslip, founded by ex-Taxback CEO Fidelma McGuirk, is to create 150 new jobs after a new fundraising round of €8.3m, valuing the company at €48m.

The news will encourage policymakers looking for signs of growth in home grown technology companies located outside Dublin. It will also be seen as progress for female-founded tech firms in Ireland.

The new jobs will mostly be in software engineering, taking the firm’s employment to almost 200 over the next 18 months.

The finance round brings Payslip’s overall funding to €12m.

MiddleGame Ventures, a Luxembourg-based venture capital firm with an office in Dublin, led the round. Local VC firms Frontline Ventures and Tribal.vc also participated, as did David Clarke, the former CTO of Workday and co-founder of Cape Clear.

Ms McGuirk said that she still owns a “large minority” of the company after the funding round.

Payslip’s technology lets other companies automate their payroll systems. It has dozens of multinational customers, including LogMeIn and Airbus.

Ms McGuirk said that the company has doubled in size in the last year, with 40pc revenue growth and a customer growth rate of 25pc per quarter.

“Where we would have targeted mid-market companies with about 3,000 people, now we have companies coming in with 44,000 people in 35 countries, or 150,000 people in like 70 countries,” she told the Irish Independent.

“Nobody else really does what we do. We’re like the Workday of payroll management. Gartner only recently created a segment for what we do and we lead in it.”

Ms McGuirk started the company in Westport in 2015 after moving to Mayo from Dublin.

Asked about efforts to build a competitive tech startup outside Dublin, she said that it’s a “new era” for attracting talent to regional areas.

“We’ve received a lot of unsolicited applications from people who want to come live in the west and are currently based in London, or other places even further afield.”

She said that while the company is still trying to attract a chief technology officer, its new vice president for engineering is moving from Dublin to Mayo.

She said that the company has an office in Dublin and is considering opening one in Cork “because of the applications we’re receiving from Cork for senior positions”.

MiddleGame Ventures’ general partner, Patrick Pinschmidt, said that the fund has backed Payslip because it’s “unique”.

“Fidelma and the Payslip team are pioneering a new technology that solves problems for clients with complex payroll needs,” he said.

“This flexible global payroll tech is unique in the marketplace.”

The new jobs have been welcomed by senior politicians.

“These 150 new jobs across Dublin and Westport are highly skilled positions and are a real vote of confidence,” said Tánaiste and Enterprise, Trade and Employment Minister Leo Varadkar.

Female Irish founders of technology companies raised more than €100m in funding during a 12-month period for the first time last year, according to TechIreland.