[mbesto]

> Is there any hard evidence that founders who secure funding earlier are more likely to provide a VC with a successful exit?

There really isn't much hard evidence about any correlative patterns about early stage VCs. Which is why their model is essentially spray and pray. The successful ones (Sequoias, a1z, etc.) are just signaling rods whereby high growth startups gravitate towards well known VCs, which in turns means signaling to M&A markets.