Abstract: This paper takes foreign investment as the entry point to study the different mechanisms of expanding high-level opening to the outside world on enterprise innovation performance and growth. It is found that the foreign investment promotes the enterprise growth and helps firms to survive in a competitive market,but it has a “double-edged sword” effect on enterprises' innovation output.The foreign investment will,to a certain extent,promote enterprise innovation,but over-reliance on foreign investment can weaken enterprises' ability to innovate on their own and hinder their high-quality development.These relationships are significantly influenced by the knowledge acquisition patterns of enterprises.The internal research and development contributes to the positive impact of foreign investment on the enterprise growth,and improves the relationship between foreign investment and enterprise innovation.Technology introduction contributes positively to the relationship between foreign investment and growth,but enhances the negative impact of foreign investment on innovation performance.

Key words: foreign investment, internal research and development, technology introduction, enterprise growth, innovation performance