In March 2003, 7 emergency directors of the largest humanitarian organisations in the USA and UK decided to stimulate collaboration and sharing of experiences between their departments, and to jointly develop practical solutions for the present emergency response capacity constraints. This was a visionary decision. Though there were other efforts to intensify relations between the agencies, there were undoubtedly still great barriers between the agencies that had to be broken down. This decision laid the foundation for a jointly developed project proposal: the Emergency Capacity Building (ECB) Project. The initial project proposal specified a project duration of 5 years and a 10 million dollar budget. The collaborative effort was well received by the donor community and the proposal received funding from the Gates Foundation for an initial period of 2 years. Some months following this grant the ECB Project received an additional and significant contribution from the Microsoft Corporation. The Tsunami delayed the start of the project for 3 months. Staff recruitment started in March 2005, and subsequently the different components of the project took off at different paces to meet different challenges. This review assesses the achievements in the first 12 months of the project and looks ahead to the final year and thereafter.