1. A predictive system for predicting the operation of a system, comprising: a data storage device for storing historical data obtained during the operation of the system; a data preprocessor for preprocessing received data from the system during operation thereof in accordance with predetermined preprocessing parameters to output preprocessed data; a system model of the system having an input for receiving said preprocessed data and mapping it to an output through a stored representation of the system in accordance with associated model parameters that define said stored representation; a control device for controlling said data preprocessor in a training mode to preprocess said stored historical data and output preprocessed historical data and, in a runtime mode, to receive and preprocess runtime data received from the system during operation thereof to output preprocessed runtime data; a training device operating in said training mode to train said system model with said stored historical data in accordance with a predetermined training algorithm to define said model parameters; and said system model operating in said runtime mode to generate a predicted output for the received output preprocessor runtime data from said data preprocessor.