AT&T says it has now deployed 3G small cells across 18 different states in the US.

The states are Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, a spokesman for the operator told Light Reading Monday evening.

The tiny basestations extend 3G HSPA+ coverage and capacity, the spokesman confirmed. The operator has these initial units installed in outdoor and indoor environments, including high-rise buildings.

The next move in AT&T's small cell strategy will be the deployment of "Multi-Standard Metrocells" (MSMs), which are expected to be introduced some time in 2014. Those units will combine 3G, 4G, and WiFi, support carrier aggregation between the 700 MHz and AWS spectrum bands, and will eventually become the carrier's standard small cell.

The burning question now, though, is -- how many small cells has AT&T deployed so far? The operator isn't saying, but it expects to have deployed at least 40,000 of the tiny basestations by the end of 2015.

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— Dan Jones, Mobile Editor, Light Reading