Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is increasingly being applied in hardware and software domains to reduce manual effort in the development and testing of complex systems. While most tasks focus on design automation of integrated circuits, particularly with hardware description languages, other types of hardware exist! This survey examines how GenAI has been and is being utilized across the printed circuit board (PCB) design life cycle, covering supply chains, system specification, circuit design, layout and optimization, validation and testing, and PCB assembly and distribution. Through this lens, we present a taxonomy of discovered works categorized by their intent and contributions. This survey also identifies key technical challenges GenAI faces in this space, such as domain-specific data scarcity and limited support for integration with existing PCB tools. Finally, future research directions are discussed, showing that there are many opportunities remaining for integrating GenAI into various tasks in PCB design and testing.
Blogger's Review: The application of GenAI in PCB design holds great potential, yet the current challenges of data scarcity and tool integration need to be addressed. Future research could focus on enhancing design efficiency and testing accuracy through better utilization of GenAI.