企业是创新的主体，提高企业创新水平对内有助于增强核心竞争力，对外也有利于推动我国经济的高质量发展。但囿于创新的高投入、高风险、高回收期等特点，企业难以单凭内部资金满足对研发资金长期稳定且充盈的需求，且因信息不对称的问题，通常也面临较多外部融资约束，因此部分企业甚至不惜通过加杠杆的方式以暂时缓解资金压力。进入数字时代之后，凭借数字技术的持续赋能和海量数据的强大支持，数字普惠金融的迅速发展，在一定程度上能有效解决创新企业的融资问题。

基于此，本文旨在研究数字普惠金融的发展对企业创新发展的影响及内在机制。首先，将2013-2020年间北京大学数字普惠金融指数的城市数据与我国所有A股上市公司的个体数据进行匹配，采用双向固定效应模型作为基准模型，研究数字普惠金融的发展对企业创新发展的激励效应。然后，综合考虑企业和地区两个层面的异质性特征，分别引入规模类型、产权性质、行业属性及金融基础四个调节变量，以分析这些特征对该创新激励效应的调节作用。最后，本文还将融资约束和杠杆水平两个变量分别引入到基准模型当中，以进一步检验该创新激励效应的内在传导机制。

本文得到的主要结论如下：第一，数字普惠金融的发展对企业创新发展能够产生显著的激励效应，即随着数字普惠金融发展水平的不断提高，企业的创新产出及投入均会发生同向变化，表明数字普惠金融的发展有助于增强企业的研发动机和创新能力。第二，该创新激励效应具有一定的企业异质性和地区异质性，即对于中小型企业、非国有企业、高新技术类企业及所在地区金融基础较好的企业而言，其创新行为能够从中获得的边际效用相对更大。第三，融资约束和杠杆水平在该创新激励效应中发挥着显著的内在传导作用，即数字普惠金融能够通过缓解外部融资约束和降低内部杠杆水平两条路径间接促进企业创新产出的增加，且主要受益类型为技术含量更高、难度系数更大、资金需求更多的实质性创新活动。

基于上述结论，本文最后分别从三类主体出发提出以下建议：首先在政府层面，应加强对数字普惠金融及企业创新的政策支持，推动相关基础设施建设，强化金融风险监管，为科技创新提供良好的发展环境；其次在金融机构层面，应加快完成自身的数字化转型升级，提供个性化信贷支持，以精准赋能企业的研发创新项目；最后在企业层面，应加强内部的财务制度建设、优化自身财务行为，尤其需加强杠杆管理，为研发创新创造稳定的内部财务环境。

Enterprises are the main participants in innovation, and improving the ability to innovate can enhance their own core competitiveness and also promote high-quality economic development. Limited by the characteristics of high input, high risk and high payback period of innovation, it’s difficult for them to meet R&D funding needs internally. Because of information asymmetry, they also have to face more external financing constraints, and even increase leverage ratios to alleviate capital pressure. With the empowerment of digital technology and the support of massive data, digital inclusive finance has emerged and developed rapidly, helping to solve the above problems efficiently.

In this regard, this paper aims to study the impact and internal mechanism of digital inclusive finance on enterprise innovation. First of all，this paper matches the urban data of the Digital Inclusive Finance Index from Peking University with the individual data of all A-share listed companies between 2013 and 2020, and studies the total effect of digital inclusive finance on enterprise innovation based on the two-way fixed effect model. And then, this paper adds four moderator variables, scale type, property nature, industry attribute and financial basis, to analyze the moderating effect. Finally, this paper further introduces two variables, financing constraint and leverage ratio, into the two-way fixed effect model, to test the intrinsic conduction mechanism of the innovation incentive effect.

The main conclusions are as follows. First, the development of digital inclusive finance has a significant incentive effect on enterprise innovation. In other words, with the continuous development of digital inclusive finance, enterprises’ innovation inputs and outputs will change in the same direction, which is described as the innovation incentive effect of digital inclusive finance on enterprises. Second, this effect has the characteristics of firm heterogeneity and region heterogeneity. It means that the innovation incentive effect is more significant on these enterprises with medium and small scale, non-state property, high-tech characteristics and good regional financial foundation. Third, financing constraints and leverage ratios all play a significant internal conduction role in this effect. That is, digital inclusive finance indirectly promotes the increase of enterprise innovation outputs through alleviating external financing constraints and reducing internal leverage ratios, and the main type of benefits is substantive innovation behaviors.

Based on the above conclusions, this paper finally puts forward the following suggestions for the three types of subjects. First, the government should increase policy supports for digital inclusive finance and enterprise innovation, promote related infrastructure construction and strengthen financial risk supervision to provide a good development environment for scientific and technological innovation. Second, financing institutions should accelerate the digital transformation and provide personalized credit supports to precisely empower enterprise innovation projects. Third, enterprises should strengthen the construction of internal financial system and optimize their own financial behaviors, especially need to strengthen leverage management, to create a stable internal financial environment.