Telecom equipment maker Alcatel- Lucent on Tuesday showcased a network chipset that can process internet data speed of 400 gigabits per second, which is four times faster than its current chips.

"This chip (FP3 400 G) creates tremendous potential, not just in terms of technology, but in terms of how people connect and interact with each other. At the line card level, 400 Gb/s of processing capacity are available through a single network processing chipset," Alcatel-Lucent Chief Executive Officer Ben Verwaayen said.

FP3 400 G chipsets are meant to be used in telecom network routers to support the internet traffic that passes through routers. Commercial shipping of the processor would start in 2012, Verwaayen said.

In layman terms, routers are like nodes which distribute and direct internet traffic to connect various points in the network. These network connections are spread across billions of computer servers and computer users.

In a telecom network there are various routers, to co-ordinate internet traffic flow between various servers and access devices like personal computers, mobile phones or any device from which internet can be accessed. Availability of high speed network processor increases the speed of data flow in the telecom network.

Alcatel-Lucent said that a FP3 400G network processor can carry 70,000 simultaneous High Definition (HD) video streams, 235000 simultaneous YouTube video streams , 46000 simultaneous Facebook photo postings, 33000 simultaneous remote surgery sessions and many others at one go.