The acronyms ICO & ITO stand for Initial-Coin-Offering & Inital-Token-Offering, respectively;
An Initial-Coin-Offering / Initial-Token-Offering is a form of unregulated crowdsourcing of funds.
A heavily marketed event, during an ICO/ITO investors buy crypto-assets from startups to fund them for the development of a product that will be powered by (or used in tandem with) the asset.