Several African countries have also been fascinating for the growth of cellular telephone.

Grids require an amount of cohesion that isn't always on-hand in that part of the world (a fancy way of saying "When they built the grid in Europe, they could mostly put copper on telephone poles and assume nobody would just show up and steal it later"). But a cellular node can be built to be self-contained and protected by a single property owner with a shotgun.

It became a much faster and cheaper rollout solution and the demand created a market to justify the cost of improving and perfecting the technology.