Only 18 per cent of Indian companies have implemented regulatory compliance programmes, which is lower than the Asia Pacific average of 42 per cent, according to a recent survey.

The level of compliance programmes implementation in India lags behind compared to Japan (58 per cent) and Singapore (52 per cent), a survey conducted by Market Share for Serena Software, the global independent software company said.

The 2007 Asia-Pacific Chief Information Officer (CIO) survey measured the understanding of IT and regulatory compliance, levels of compliance-related implementations and IT spending directed at compliance-related activities, a release said.

Eighty eight per cent of Indian CIOs realised the importance of IT in ensuring regulatory compliance but other senior management did not share the same view. Less than half, around 44 per cent of India CIOs, feel that upper management support the role of IT for compliance.

Only 20 per cent reported that they currently spent more than 15 per cent of their total IT budget on compliance related activities.