as I have stated elsewere :
the cool thing was a fighting fund on anything.
so for every dollar or pound spent you have to supply the same amount into the fighting fund ,which happens to half your budget .
This fund is then transferred back on aperfomance related basis ,so as to give minardi the biggest amount.
One would think very deep to spend these sums to effectively sponsor the minnows...and of course Minardi would get a quite substantial budget and start to become a real contender.
After two or three years things would have levelled out all having the same sum to spend and competition would only be won by beeing brighter or beeing more talented or determined.
There would be no scope for huge investments then as your potential gain would be the competitors also.....