VMware has announced vFabric Suite 5.1, which the company says has new capabilities to automate the implementation and management of applications on VMware cloud infrastructure.

The new incarnation also introduces an in-memory distributed SQL database, vFabric Postgres, which will help to reduce database costs and increase agility.

VMware notes that the suite combines its Spring development framework, acquired a few years back, with vFabric application services, and a per-VM licensing model.

The company states that version 5.1 will provide the core services required to build and run Java Spring applications, both on premise, and in the cloud.

Jerry Chen, vice president, Cloud and Application Services, VMware, commented: "The cloud era is driving a transformation in applications. Today, most are built with open source development frameworks, deployed on lightweight application containers, run on virtual infrastructure and are data intensive.

"This is driving a real transition in the type of technologies our customers are using to build, run and manage these new applications. Since introducing the vFabric Suite a year ago we have seen remarkable adoption amongst our customers, helping our Cloud Application Platform business to nearly double in year over year growth in 2011."

VMware vFabric Suite 5.1 will be pushed out at some point this quarter, and will be licensed with prices starting at $1,500 (around £940) per VM.