An ICO, or Initial Coin Offering, is a way for a company to create its own crypto currency and then offer it for sale to its customers.
This crypto currency can have its own blockchain, as was the case for Ethereum in 2014, or it can run on a token basis on another blockchain, like the ERC20 tokens that run on Ethereum. This latter method is the more common. This is also the method LOOiX used to create its LOOiX tokens. In an ICO, the buyers of the tokens exchange crypto currencies with the company for the newly created tokens. The company receives the money and the buyers receive the tokens.