Colleges and universities play a crucial role in fostering innovation, making it essential to explore effective strategies for promoting innovation at the institutional policy level. This paper focuses on the establishment of intellectual property model cities as a starting point and conducts an empirical analysis using innovation data from 234 cities and 942 colleges and universities between 2007 and 2017. By constructing a multi-temporal double-difference model, this study reveals that the establishment of intellectual property model cities effectively fosters innovation in colleges and universities. Further analysis demonstrates that this promotional effect is particularly significant in the western region, key cities, and key colleges and universities, as well as in the fields of invention and utility model patents. These conclusions withstand a series of robustness tests, confirming their validity. This study reveals that the national intellectual property pilot city policy has a significant influence on university innovation. It achieves this by encouraging investment in research and development and enhancing collaboration in innovation. The findings of this study provide important policy suggestions for maximizing the innovation potential of the intellectual property model city policy. This, in turn, can contribute to economic transformation, upgrading, and the promotion of innovation development in China.

Low-carbon urban policy (LCUP) and corporate green innovation are considered crucial strategies and methods for reducing urban carbon emissions, addressing climate change, and promoting urban environmental sustainability. This study constructed a quasi-natural experiment based on the low-carbon city strategy program implemented in China in 2010, utilizing data from Chinese prefecture-level cities and publicly listed companies from 2005 to 2020. Employing a multi-period difference-in-differences (DID) approach, this paper reveals that the establishment of low-carbon model cities effectively fosters green innovation in corporations. Further analysis demonstrates that this promotional effect is particularly significant in non-state-owned enterprises, enterprises with high media attention, those with a high level of digitalization, and enterprises located in cities with high levels of green finance and in the Eastern and Central regions of China. These conclusions withstood a series of robustness tests, confirming their validity. Meanwhile, the examination of policy mechanisms reveals that public environmental awareness, government environmental regulation, and corporate environmental information disclosure are three key policy transmission mechanisms through which LCUP affects corporate green innovation. The findings of this study provide significant empirical insights for addressing climate change and enhancing the sustainable capacity of urban environments.