Purpose: The majority of the burden of SARI-related mortality in developed countries is within intensive care units (ICUs). Increasingly, intensive care is becoming a standard element of the health care system in low and middle-income countries. However, the availability of high-quality data for critically ill patients in the early phases of a SARI outbreak is often poor. The lack of pre-populated ethics approvals, data sharing agreements, and research infrastructure makes this data often slow to help guide clinical practice for severely affected patients. This study aims to establish a rapid clinical research response capability for a future epidemics or pandemics of severe respiratory disease Methods & Materials: This is a multi-centre, prospective, short period incidence observational study of patients in participating ICUs with SARI. The study period will comprise a 5 to 7-day cohort study enrolling patients, of all ages, meeting a modified SARI case-definition, who are newly admitted to the ICUs at participating sites. Through this, we have developed standardized case-report forms and a data-capture platform to better establish global readiness for evidence generation for critically ill patients with SARI. Results: As of writing, we have ethics approval in 231 institutions, representing every continent and income group, with further expansion imminent. 115 sites have opened for recruitment and data collection for the first season in the Northern Hemisphere is recently completed with Southern Hemisphere collection to be completed between July and September 2016. The primary challenge in establishing this infrastructure is in obtaining ethical approvals and ensuring data quality is maintained. Preliminary results of the first season of recruitment will be presented. Conclusion: Through SPRINT-SARI, we are creating a sustainable infrastructure for real-time data collection for better describing critically ill patients with SARI, in all regions of the planet. Creation of this enterprise will allow for effective risk-adjustment for SARI, as well as providing new insight into the changing epidemiology of SARI and management strategies among critically ill patients around the world. This infrastructure will iteratively improve over subsequent years to ensure data quality, accuracy of denominator projections, and applicability to diverse clinical contexts.