Brisbane-based cloud and web development company ATech has been awarded a $400,000 grant through the government’s Boosting Female Founders program.

Founded by Sarah-Jane Peterschlingmann, an ACS member who previously sat on the Brisbane Branch Executive Committee, ATech has built and hosted websites and web apps for the likes of Virgin Australia, Seqwater, and the Brisbane City Council.

Peterschlingmann said the government funding will be “a game changer” for her business.

“ATech has been completely bootstrapped to date,” she said. “So this grant from the federal government will be the first time we’ve had an opportunity to properly invest in business growth.”

The government fronted $52.2 million for funding the Boosting Female Founders Initiative in an effort to help businesses founded by women scale up and expand into different markets.

Grants up to $480,000 were available for female founders, putting ATech toward the upper bounds of the program’s funding.

The money will go toward ATech’s international growth project.

“ATech has proven that it is possible to run a globally competitive business from Queensland,” Peterschlingmann said.

“We’re successfully competing in a market that is dominated by some of the world’s largest companies.

“We’re so excited to have the opportunity to take that business model to the international market with the support of the Boosting Female Founders Grant.”

ATech’s success follows Microsoft’s acquisition of fellow Brisbane business, and River City Labs tenant, Clipchamp last year.

ATech is one of 89 businesses to receive its share of the $52.2 million in government grants through the Boosting Female Founders program.

The government was criticised for its bungling of the program last year when the department in charge of the grants accidentally sent out an email congratulating over 1,000 women entrepreneurs for their progression to the next stage of the grant process.

Within a few hours, another mass email was sent apologising for the error.

It prompted calls for change to how the government supports women-founded businesses, especially from Yasmin Grigaliunas, CEO of the World’s Biggest Garage Sale – another Brisbane-based company – in which retailer Officeworks this week bought a 21 per cent stake.