Sounds pretty normal usage to my UK English ears. In fact, I'd say that "need" and "require" are usually interchangeable.

Also agree - my UK ears do not cringe at the "need", sounds fine to me too (as does require!!)

Thirded!

@Selkie: Meine nichtnativen Ohrgefühle decken sich mit denen von Lis u. bluearmy. Könntest Du noch etwas genauer beschreiben, in welchen Fällen Dir "need" komisch vorkommt und Du nur "require" verwenden würdest?

In some novel I read, an British and an American woman have a phone conversation.
One says: "I need you to do ..."
Answer:"British or American need?"

So there seems to be a distict difference in usage.

To clarify: I need to get a haircut, He needs three more points to win the game, but it requires a great deal of effort, not "it needs". Going out on a limb, I claim that a US-speaker would not say "it needs" in the sense of "it is necessary." For us, a person needs, a situation does not.

As far as I inferred from the novel, the British need is also more urgent than the American.
But I never found a way to substantiate this inference.

require verb (required, requiring) 1 a to need something; b to wish to have something. 2 to demand, exact or command by authority. 3 to have as a necessary or essential condition for success, fulfilment, etc

In the third meaning it would also sounds a bit odd to me to use "need", but it might just be me... everything looks weird when you stare at it too hard!

For example, here, I wouldn't replace "requires" with "needs":
"Outstanding achievement in a challenging business climate requires ideas and insights that go beyond the routine" http://www.bcone.com/ideas/iap.html

@Selkie

That's wierd, I used to do editing work for an in-house magazine for a _very_ large US company, and they always used "need" which I usually changed (without success) to "require". I thought it was American sloppiness ;-))

But as CM2DD says, if you look at or say anything long enough it sounds strange.

BTW, I'll send you a mail sometime - really busy right now ...

That is weird, Tete. Now I am more confused than when I started. To sum up:
To my way of thinking, in the following sentence:
This sort of structural change needs the support of many great minds.

needs should read requires or necessitates. Bluearmy, Lis and Ellkay seem to disagree, CM2DD and Tete seem to agree. Have I got it so far? I would have argued that it is not used this way in the US, but apparently I am wrong. Any US speakers want to weigh in on this one?

I think many times I interchange needs and requires. I probably would have used requires in the ideas phrase, but in the other cases it would probably depend on my audience and whether it was written or spoken. In formal writing, I probably would change needs to requires, especially, if I thought it was an absolute necessity for success or utilization (i.e. computer program). I find requires to be stronger than needs.

In casual conversations, I probably use needs unless I want to emphasize the fact or statement or situation. I also notice that I change my vocabulary choices depending on my conversational partners, so if I am in a more formal environment or with certain people than I will gravitate towards require(s) instead of need(s).

I mis-typed:
I would NOT have used needs in the ideas phrase and instead used requires. The other phrases I might have used needs or at least initially. Depending on my audience, I might have edited needs out and replaced with requires.