Plenty of non-crypto companies get started that way, but there is the catch that i don't think anyone is allowed to "invest" in such things and get shares out of it. It's a very regulamentated environment.
On the other hand, in crypto, you can sell "shares", coins to anybody anywhere in the world.
It would be better to start and ICO that are cryptorelated because it's the trend now and it's easy to invest without the KYC.
Just make sure your idea is good, something that is unique and would change the world for the better, have some good team that are known and has good credentials, some are just hiring those popular personalities as their adviser, that way you have some little exposure and your project would be notice.
But, remember the most important is to have the money to pay for the advertising because without it, even how good your project is, it won't be notice.
So going back to this - the regulated enviroment pertains specifically to the US. I've heard of making companies in the Cayman Islands because their defenition of a 'Security' is different than that of the U.S. The heavy regulation comes down to how a country defines a security.
Let's say I want to start an ICO that collects everyones investment and buys up coffee shops. The profits of those coffee shops can be returned to token owners on a quarterly basis as divdeneds - this sounds a lot like owning stock and therefore is a security..
Has anyone seen creative ways ICO's define tokens to make them as least 'security-like' as possible?
