I would focus on the cost issue. If they are going to be
using Websphere, then they will need to use VAJ Enterprise
Edition. VAJ EE is $2800 per developer (site licenses or
government discounts would make it less). WAS Advanced
Edition is $10,000+ depending on how many processors are
involved.
BTW, there are some non-development issues in regards to
using WAS. One of the really nice administrative features
is cloning. With minimal effort, an administrator can clone
a server onto another server and have the two machines be
load balanced.
