A DAO that wants to own the Dune Bible has to buy it back from its founder after he pitched in $3 million of his own money to win the auction

• Soban Saqib pitched in $3 million to win the bid for the famous Dune Bible.
• Now he has to figure out how to sell the item to the DAO he founded, so it can be the owner.

Soban Saqib didn't want to lose the bid for a beloved item like the ConstitutionDAO did.

When his crypto collective, once called Dune DAO but renamed Spice DAO, came up short in its bid for the iconic "Dune Bible," he pitched in about $3 million to win it at auction.

But here's the catch: Saqib, who goes by "Soby" online, became the item's owner but then faced the conundrum of how to make it the property of the DAO.

The property in question is a collection of plans for the "greatest movie that was never made" based on the Frank Herbert novel "Dune."

After the novel came out in the US in 1965, director Alejandro Jodorowsky started working on a film that he envisioned would be 10 to 15 hours long, but the project was "doomed," according to Christie's. The remains of the plans became known as the Dune Bible.

Spice DAO had its eyes set on the Dune Bible but raised only about $750,000 at the time of auction, according to Decrypt. Instead, it was sold to Soby for 2.6 million euros (about $3 million), according to Christie's.

As for why he threw in funds, he told Decrypt that "no one wants to raise all this money and not win, so I did it." By contrast, ConstitutionDAO, a group that brought the concept of decentralized autonomous organizations to the mainstream, raised more than $40 million to bid on a copy of the US Constitution but then lost.

In a Nov. 22 tweet, Spice DAO wrote on Twitter that Soby "secured the Jodorowsky's Dune Bible successfully with his personal fund ... We are continuing the crowd raise to formally acquire the Bible from Soby into the on-chain ownership of the DAO."

Now, according to the DAO's Juicebox wallet, it has about 2,609 ether, the equivalent of about $12 million. With that money, the DAO said it plans to acquire the Dune Bible, and fund an animated film or series, "inspired by the intent and vision of Jodorowsky's Dune."

The DAO and Soby did not immediately respond to Insider's Twitter messages for comment.

On Twitter, Soby wrote, "We hope, with the help the community, to carry on the legacy and take a dream unrealized and make it our own. If you're a fellow spiritual warrior, we invite you to contribute to Spice DAO."