12:25 PM -- Bright House Networks said it will launch "Road Runner Lightning," a new Docsis 3.0 tier, in its Central Florida region starting next month. (See Bright House Expands Wideband Footprint.)

Bright House's new wideband tier, which borrows the brand Time Warner Cable Inc. (NYSE: TWC) is using to promote its own Docsis 3.0 services, is starting off with speeds topping out at 40 Mbit/s downstream and 4 Mbit/s upstream. Its next-fastest tier is Road Runner Turbo (20 Mbit/s down by 2 Mbit/s up).

Pricing on the new tier is dependent on what service packages customers subscribe to, but the cost of the D3 offering is roughly $30 more per month than the Road Runner Standard service (10 Mbit/s down by 1 Mbit/s upstream) and may be had for as low as $15 more per month, according to Bright House.

It hasn't announced a specific launch for its Central Florida properties, which include Orlando and the surrounding area, but customers will have access to the service sometime in May.

Central Florida will mark the second Bright House system to get Docsis 3.0. The MSO has already introduced it in its Tampa Bay division. It hasn't announced when it might do the same in other Bright House markets, which include portions of Bakersfield, Calif.; Birmingham, Ala.; Detroit; and Indianapolis.

— Jeff Baumgartner, Site Editor, Light Reading Cable