Agillion's taste was something even venture capitalists could not swallow.

The Texas-based start-up was one of those delightful Internet confections that blended an explosion of desirable ingredients together once in 1999: a well-connected founder, an over-the-top set of investors, $40 million in funding and a world-changing business model. But after that initial heavy sampling, its investors pushed their chairs back from the table, groaning for mercy, and refused to take any more bites on a second round of $30 million. Without the money to move forward, and after pink-slipping half of Agillion's workers at the beginning of 2001, the application service provider, or ASP, sent another 50% of its workforce home hungry this week and decided to close up shop.

I can take slight solace in the fact that while our tech-stock nausea is often unbearable, public investors were saved from this particular agent of gastric distress. File this in the recipe holder under "indigestion."

The start-up had it all. Of course it was rich: A divine set of investors, the likes of Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Hambrecht & Quist, Integral Capital Partners, Cisco (CSCO:Nasdaq - news - boards) and MSD Capital, formed its base with a decadent $40 million in first-round funding in November 1999. Cisco, Office Depot (ODP:NYSE - news - boards) and IBM (IBM:NYSE - news - boards) counted Agillion among several key partners in their bundled offerings to small and medium-sized businesses.

Management was equally enticing. Founders Steve Papermaster and Frank Moss, former CEOs of BSG and IBM acquisition Tivoli, respectively, had proven management and entrepreneurial success between them. Not to mention that Papermaster had pals Michael Dell's and George W. Bush's ears. Papermaster kept his and Agillion's profile high in the Texas Internet scene, sponsoring local conferences and even, oh God, an Austin polo club team.

You might need more than milk to wash this down.

Agillion wasn't necessarily all form, no substance. It joined the ranks of the business world as one of the new application service providers -- rebellious software vendors that would provide small and medium businesses with the software they wanted without going through a money- and time-consuming SAP (SAP:NYSE - news - boards) or Peoplesoft (PSFT:Nasdaq - news - boards) rollout. Want to manage your customers? Go to Agillion, pick the applications you want and access them over the Web. The concept was quick, cheap and easy. Living up to the ASP promise, however, was not.

Before that defining truth became evident, Agillion turned to Internet gluttony. You've heard it all before: Agillion paid $2 million to $3 million to run a 2000 SuperBowl ad in 10 markets. It sent all its employees and their guests to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, in the spring of 2000.

Do you smell smoke? Let me grab my fiddle just in case.

Agillion had to trim down the $20 million it devoted to, say it with me, a marketing budget. By the time newspapers around the country were quoting Papermaster as a high-tech executive supporter of President Bush's tax cut and technology savvy, Agillion had laid off half its more than 100 people.

Papermaster stepped aside in November 2000 and handed his chef's hat to James Travers, previously the CEO of e-commerce player Harbinger. Already IT spending was emitting a sour, funky smell, and it was time to close up shop.