Let $\lambda$ be a fixed integer exceeding $1$ and $s_n$ any strictly increasing sequence of positive integers satisfying $s_n\le n^{15/14+o(1)}.$ In this paper we give a version of the large sieve inequality for the sequence $\lambda^{s_n}.$ In particular, we obtain nontrivial estimates of the associated trigonometric sums ``on average" and establish equidistribution properties of the numbers $\lambda^{s_n} , n\le p(\log p)^{2+\varepsilon}$, modulo $p$ for most primes $p.$