By Conor Keane
COMPETITION for the eyes of New York's Irish community is set to intensify with the €2.2 million takeover of the Irish Echo. The stage is now set for the city's oldest Irish newspaper to take on the influential Irish Voice, which has won a high profile on both sides of the Atlantic through the participation of the paper's founding publisher Niall O'Dowd in the peace process.

Meteor Mobile Communications director Sean Finlay has agreed to purchase the paper from the Echo's formidable publisher Claire Grimes.

Founded in 1928, the Irish Echo is the oldest continuously-published Irish-American weekly newspaper with a circulation of 60,000, 40% subscription sales and 60% news stand.

Mr Finlay and Mrs Grimes yesterday confirmed that a deal has been signed for Mr Finlay to take over the newspaper in January.

The Meteor man has come close to buying the paper in the past and intends to keep its full-time staff of 17, mostly based in the Echo's Fifth Avenue office, and plans to open an Dublin office in the new year.

In a clear signal that he intends to compete head on with the Irish Voice, Mr Finlay is sending the general manager of his main company to the US.

RF Communications boss Noel Minogue is being sent to New York to "plan for expansion and rejuvenation of the publication".

Commenting on the sale, Mrs Grimes said: "An exciting chapter is yet to be written in the long proud history of the Irish Echo, and it's time now for the new byline to be Sean Finlay's."