Plenty of good business news came from Washingtonian’s Tech Titans during the past year. The 2021 winners—who were selected through both reporting and an informal process of nominations from their peers—managed to start up new and innovative companies, close on huge funding rounds, and ink massive contracts.

Tobin Moore and Adam Vitarello, founders of Optoro—which offers technology to help retailers process, manage, and resell returned and overstock inventory—created a nationwide contactless-return network in 2020.