What you are seeing is the motor which is an AC motor. The center of it is a simple gearbox. Because an electric motor can be throttled and can run up to a speed far beyond what a gasoline driven engine can run, there doesn't need to be a transmission. Then to the other side is a **three phase tri-pole inverter** which converts the DC battery power into AC power to run the motor. (You may have something similar which you use to power a laptop or other A/C using devices in your vehicle, but this one is on a whole different scale.) [This *How it's Made Dream Cars*](http://youtu.be/ZOriitPjlcw) episode (S02E10) explains how everything is put together.