This showcase paper describes the Global Interaction Research Initiative - GIRI - recently inaugurated at the IT University of Copenhagen. It presents the motivation for this initiative, namely that the use of information technology is the core enabling factor for global collaboration and business. We argue that there is a fundamental need for understanding and providing next generation technologies for this ultra large-scale interaction paradigm. GIRI is organized around a set of research themes and projects, focusing on different application areas. Themes and projects are loosely coupled in the sense that each research project is defined in its own right with a specific set of challenges, vision, approach, partners, and funding scheme. At the time of writing, GIRI has 3 research themes and are hosting 6 projects, but these numbers are expected to increase as GIRI grows. GIRI is an open research initiative, and we invite other researchers to join.