The Standard Cirrus was designed by Dipl. Ing. Klaus Holighaus and flew for the first time in March 1969. It is a Standard Class glider with a 15 metre span and no camber-changing flaps. The all-moving tailplane, a feature of many designs of that period due to its theoretically higher efficiency, caused less than desirable high-speed stability characteristics, and so modifications were made to the early design. Even so, the glider is still very sensitive in pitch. By April 1977, when production by Schempp-Hirth ended, a total of 700 Standard Cirruses had been built, including 200 built under licence by Grob between 1972 and July 1975. A French firm, Lanaverre Industrie, had also built 38 Standard Cirruses under licence by 1979. VTC of Yugoslavia also licence-built Standard Cirruses, reaching approximately 100 by 1985. Improvements were made with the Standard Cirrus 75. These included better air-brakes with an increased frontal area.