If there's no fees how would the project be funded? Companies would profit and donate money?
The IOTA Foundation was founded in 2016 after 5% of all existing iotas were donated by the early investors. The foundation supports the development and projects. The value of this iota owned by the foundation currently stands at $ 50-60 million. While the boom back in January, it was even close to $300 million.
In short, IOTA does not need any fees and thus no miners because each client that creates a transaction must previously confirm two other transactions via PoW. That's the concept that makes miners obsolete.