By Sarah Kyo, Web Communications Specialist

(This summer, SJSU Today hits the road, visiting students and recent grads on the job across the country and around the world. Our Spartans at Work series continues with economics alumnus Andrew Manoske.)

Where will an SJSU degree take you? How about spotting the next big thing? San Jose is the heart of Silicon Valley, where startup companies rely on venture capital to grow. Andrew Manoske, ’10 Economics, is in on the action as an associate with GGV Capital.

Based in Menlo Park with offices in Beijing, Shanghai and Singapore, GGV Capital works with U.S. and Asian companies that already have an established product, but want to take the next big step, including significant funding. This is known as expansion stage, and some of the firm’s prominent success stories include Alibaba, Pandora and Tudou (the Chinese YouTube).

For Manoske, a typical day at the office is outside the office. He regularly meets with clients, the people who “spend every waking moment thinking about how we can use technology to change the world.”

“Every day, I get to meet great entrepreneurs and other venture capitalists that are just really charged, excited, passionate about what they do,” he said.

Manoske, who minored in Computer Science, feels inspired by the people he works with on the job. He also felt inspired by the people and atmosphere of SJSU when applying to this university.

“San José State made hackers,” he said. “They made people who could take very, very little and make amazing, wonderful things out of it, and that was something that really appealed to me. ”