V-Ray 1.6 for SketchUp in Open Beta

Chaos Group announced a major upgrade intended to simplify and improve workflow, render quality and scene complexity.
3D interior rendering of a room with patterned walls and three windows

Archive notice: This article was originally published on May 21, 2013. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
The key features include V-Ray RT (a CPU-supported render engine), Dome Light (which enables simple, artefact-free image-based lighting) and V-Ray Proxy (which is intended to save a considerable amount of RAM by, among other things, rendering geometry more efficiently). 

Here you can find the feature list and beta programme.