Cable company Charter Communications said it has no interest in buying Sprint. After reports that Sprint owner SoftBank proposed a merger with Charter, the cable company said it will move forward in its plan to offer wireless service without buying the carrier.

"We understand why a deal is attractive for SoftBank, but Charter has no interest in acquiring Sprint," Charter said in a statement provided to Ars and other news outlets. "We have a very good MVNO relationship with Verizon and intend to launch wireless services to cable customers next year."

SoftBank reportedly proposed a merger that would combine Sprint and Charter to create a new entity controlled by SoftBank, rather than a merger in which Charter would buy Sprint. Still, Charter's statement seems to make it clear that it doesn't want to combine its cable network with Sprint's nationwide wireless network. Charter plans to resell Verizon Wireless service inside its cable territory rather than nationwide.

Comcast and Charter are wireless partners

Comcast and Charter, the two biggest US cable companies, announced an agreement in May to cooperate in their plans to sell mobile phone service. That agreement also forbids each company from making wireless mergers and acquisitions without the other's consent for one year. Shortly after that agreement, Comcast and Charter started talking to Sprint about potentially investing in Sprint's network in exchange for better terms in a deal to resell Sprint data.

It doesn't appear that those talks will lead to a merger. "Comcast has made clear it wasn’t interested in participating in any merger with Sprint," The Wall Street Journal wrote yesterday. Sprint is now free "to resume merger talks with rival T-Mobile USA, which it had held earlier this year."

Disclosure: The Advance/Newhouse Partnership, which owns about 13 percent of Charter, is part of Advance Publications. Advance Publications owns Condé Nast, which owns Ars Technica.