Open source tools developer SpringSource yesterday announced the general availability of its new enterprise applications package.

SpringSource Enterprise is bundled with software, services and tech support to help developers build and run Spring-based enterprise apps. The package includes the SpringSource Application Management Suite, the SpringSource Tool Suite, and the SpringSource Advanced Pack for Oracle Database.

The Palo Alto, California-based company (formerly Interface21) has been ramping up its assault on the emerging market for open source in enterprise computing. In January it acquired Tomcat contributor Covalent Technologies.

The firm’s boss Rod Johnson, who created the Spring Java and J2EE application framework in 2004, claimed earlier this year that combining the two companies' resources would give enterprises an open source alternative that can match or beat established proprietary software for performance and quality.

SpringSource upped its game as a serious open source contender in the Java application server market in late April with the beta release of the SpringSource Application Platform, its Java application server.

Last month the Silicon Valley start-up confirmed that it had closed a $15m round of venture capital financing that would help the company continue to expand its operations and plump up its growth strategy.

Yesterday, the firm’s senior engineering and product veep Peter Cooper-Ellis echoed Johnson's earlier claims that the commercial release of SpringSource Enterprise, coupled with the recent intro of the SpringSource Application Platform, would deliver “flexible and modular alternatives that the market is looking for in their application infrastructure". ®