In the era of digital economy, promoting the deep integration of digital technology and the real economy has become the key to achieving high-quality economic development.In this context, in October 2019, the National Development and Reform Commission and the Central Cyberspace Office jointly formulated and issued the Implementation Plan of the National Digital Economy Innovation and Development Pilot Zone (hereinafter referred to as the Plan), establishing Xiong' New Area; Zhejiang Province, Fujian Province, Sichuan Province, Guangdong Province, Chongqing City and other places as national digital economy innovation and development pilot zones ( hereinafter referred to as the pilot zones).The pilot zones promote high-quality development, and keep improving the level of internationalization of the regional digital economy, thus playing a leading and radiating role.#br#The digital economy is vital for enterprises to seek breakthroughs in independent innovation, and data has become an important factor in production in this era.However, the pilot zones directly drive the development of the digital economy, relevant research is still relatively lacking, and the impact path of the innovation effect needs to be clarified.To this end, this paper empirically examines the impact of the establishment of the pilot zone on enterprise innovation, which not only provides micro-level support for the policy dividend of the national digital economy innovation and development pilot zones, but also provides a basis and reference for promoting the construction of the pilot zones, empowering enterprise innovation, and helping to build "digital China".#br#In order to accurately evaluate the impact of the pilot zone on enterprise innovation, this paper takes the National Digital Economy Innovation and Development Pilot Zones as a quasi-natural experiment with A-share listed companies from 2016 to 2021 as the research object, and employs the DID method to conduct research.It is found that (1) the establishment of the pilot zones can promote enterprise innovation, and the supporting policies about innovative city construction, smart city creation, the national big data comprehensive pilot zones, and the broadband China demonstration city can strengthen the role of the establishment of the pilot zones in promoting enterprise innovation.(2) The establishment of the pilot zones promotes enterprise innovation by reducing transaction costs, gathering human resources, improving intellectual property protection, and accelerating digital transformation.(3) The role of the establishment of the pilot zones in promoting enterprise innovation is more significant for non-state-owned enterprises, high-tech enterprises and incumbent enterprises.Compared with incremental innovation, the establishment of pilot zones has a more significant impact on breakthrough innovation.In addition, the establishment of the pilot zones has a positive diffusion effect on the innovation of enterprises in neighboring cities, and a negative siphon effect on the innovation of enterprises in cities with similar levels of economic development.#br#The study has made marginal contributions in the following aspects.First, it examines the impact of the establishment of the pilot zone on enterprise innovation, which provides micro-level support for the dividend effect of the pilot policy.Second, it examines the impact mechanism of the establishment of the pilot zone on enterprise innovation from the dual perspectives of supply side and demand side, and analyzes the heterogeneity of impact and the externality of policy, which is more conducive to understanding the mechanism and boundary of policy effect, and provides ideas for enterprise innovation and high-quality macroeconomic development.Third, by taking the establishment of the pilot zones as an external shock, it uses the double difference method to test the main effect, and conducts a series of robustness tests to identify the net effect of the policy.#br#The implications arising from the study are as follows.First, governments at all levels should summarize the experience of digital economy innovation and development in the pilot zone, strengthen promotion and application, and give full play to the synergy effect of different policy tools so as to empower enterprise innovation.Second, it is conducive to promoting enterprise innovation from the dual perspectives of supply side and demand side by strengthening the implementation of supporting policies in the pilot zone and breaking institutional obstacles.Finally,the policy dividends of the pilot zone can be well released with targeted government guidance and precise policies.#br#