At the International AIDS Society Conference on Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention held in Sydney, Australia, in July 2007, the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) convened a satellite symposium entitled 'Accelerating the Development of Replicating Viral Vectors for AIDS Vaccines.' Its purpose was to highlight the rationale for accelerating the development of replicating viral vectors for use as vaccines against HIV-1, and to bring together vaccine scientists, regulatory officials, and public health specialists from industrialized and developing nations to discuss the major issues facing the development and testing of replicating viral vector-based vaccines.